The Time-Travelling Bandwagon Extravagansa!
by FlaxenHairedSamurai
Summary: Co-written with Fortune Maiden. Well, this is what happens when two fangirls get talking about time travel. Join us as we travel through time and space to fix history and make new friends! Rated for safety.
1. Chapter 1

**Well, this is what happens when two bored Sengoku Basara fans get talking and decide to mess with the timeline. Co written with Fortune Maiden, we both admit that we own nothing to do with Sengoku Basara, but that it holds a dear place in our hearts. **

**Now, let the madness...BEGIN!**

* * *

Alright, if someone up there's laughing at me, then quit it. There's nothing funny about a fifteen (nearly sixteen!) year old trying to rent a wooden wagon in this modern day and age. Though, if you're laughing at me about the cowpat I nearly slipped in, then yeah, carry on. That part was pretty funny. "How big did you say it needed to be?"

"Uh..." Okay, how many of us were there again? Last time I checked, it was around seven or eight, but that number was going up and up with each message. "Just give me the biggest one you've got."  
"Hmm, will this do?" Chewing on the inside of my cheek (really should stop doing that) I looked it over, tilting my head to one side. Well, there was room for at least ten people in the back and then another two on the box in front. Taking room off for supplies... "Kid?"

"Two things: Yeah, it'll do and I'm not a kid!"

"Anyone who needs to get a permission slip is a kid. Got it?" Nodding, I clenched my fists again, taking the farmer's proffered hand. If this guy didn't owe my aunt's ex husband's sister a favour... then I'd be looking for another farmer. Who would probably make me pay a lot more. Why did I hate this guy again? "Right, so I'll go grab the shire horse from the stables so you can actually get somewhere with this thing."  
Ah, a non believer. To think I used to be one. The second his back was turned, I crept onto the box, putting my hands together and scrunching my eyes. "Don't mess this up for me."

* * *

Huh... so this is what my stepdad meant by America being strange. After all, if I was steering the wagon through England then the taxis would've been black, not yellow and... what? Oh...yeah, welcome to America! Don't ask how me and the horse got here, just know that ferries are very kind to horses, and that no one questions lone travellers.

Wriggling my nose to get rid of a particularly annoying itch, I shifted my position slightly, getting rid of the numb sensation. Hopefully Fortune would be willing to lend some couch cushions for this endeavour, because if the benches in the wagon were anything like the box, then we were in for a bad time. Then again, that depended on two things: My driving skills and America's geography. As all my friends loved to joke, the girl taking GSCE Geography is also the only girl who could get lost three streets away from home, which meant in a different city, in another country on another continent, I had no chance.

But I had an advantage! One that not even the worst naysayer could dispute. I had...a satnav that may or may not have come from my brother's car. If all went well on this trip, I'd be back with enough time to replace it before he even realised it was gone. Finally, as it seemed like I was never going to get anywhere, the little computer finally dinged with the most heavenly sound, '_You have arrived at your destination.' _

Dropping from the box, I landed neatly, making my way to the wall of buzzers before me, finally hitting on a snag. I had no idea what my partner's last name is, or even her first name (common sense dictates you don't release some things online, take note kiddies) so I leapt at the chance to do something I'd always wanted to do.

Placing my finger on a button, I proceeded to drag it down, pressing every single buzzer in sight.

* * *

There was an unmistakable pain in my lungs as I dragged myself up the last step. Alright, I would never complain about the second floor in school again, this was the worst form of exercise known to man! Collapsing on the landing, I gave a small wave to the woman coming up behind me, who fixed me with an odd look and carried on walking. In an attempt to get my breathing back under control, I closed my eyes, letting my chest rise and fall slowly.

About three minutes passed, with very little foot traffic, until a foot nudged my side. "I'm gonna guess. You're the FlaxenHairedSamurai?"

Blinking slowly, I opened one eye, looking up at a semi familiar face. _Looks like __Oichi from Pokémon Conquest. _"Only if you're Fortune Maiden."

Grinning, Fortune pulled me back to both feet, frowning when I stood a little taller (genes are awesome that way.) "The wagon's out front. I'm ready to go when you are. But first... I don't suppose you'd be willing to lend some cushions?"

* * *

Once Fortunes stuff was safely loaded in the wagon, along with the food and water, I hopped back onto the box, taking up the reins again. "So 88mph, and then we'll be seeing some serious history?"

"That's the general idea." Biting my lip, I looked towards my travelling partner. With my hair tightly pulled back, there was no way of hiding my expression. I was terrified.

But with trembling hands, I urged the horse forwards, watching it steadily gain speed, until there was a flash of bright light... and fresh air hit our nostrils.


	2. Chapter 2

**Alright people, we're back and despite our best efforts, neither I nor Fortune Maiden have gained the rights to Sengoku Basara or Samurai Warriors.  
This chapter brought to you by Fortune Maiden.**

* * *

Chapter 2

Destination: ?

There are always those who place too much stock in logic and refuse to believe anything that they can't personally experience. As one of those people, I have to say…if you really, really believe in something hard enough, it'll happen. Really. Honestly.

How else would you explain racing down a highway at 88mph on a horse-drawn wooden wagon in 21st Century America one minute and staring at an authentic Japanese castle (in what is clearly not 21st Century Japan) the next?

Flaxen got out the wagon first, fully taking in the sight. "Wow, we actually made it," she said cheerfully. Of course, there was never any doubt that we would (really), but still. We actually made it to…to…

_"You have arrived at your destination."_ The GPS's robotic voice caused us both to jump. I looked over at the little computer.

"Huh? It still works? I thought we were heading to the past. Before computers and all." I said tapping the device with one finger. The display wasn't changing. All it showed was a wide-open space and a crudely drawn little castle icon with a bright red flag over it. Flaxen peered over the wagon to have a better look.

"Yeah, I guess it does," she shrugged, "I guess it's still getting a connection from somewhere. But that doesn't matter, look at the top of the screen." I did as she instructed.

There were two things of note there. The name of the destination our course had been set to was the first. It read "Oshu." That was the first oddity.

"I thought we were headed to Owari to get the Odas first," I told Flaxen. That was how the messages panned out anyway. She just smiled mysteriously.

"Let's save the best for last."

Well, I couldn't argue with that logic. Besides we had two very important things to pick up in Oshu: a horse and a driver. Our horse was nice and all, but he wouldn't be able to handle such a long journey by himself. It would be nice to have a backup, and there was only one equine suitable for the job. The driver was necessary because admittedly, neither Flaxen nor I could drive…how we even got this far was a mystery. As with the horse, there was only one man suitable for the job.

And he lived in Oshu castle. But not just any old Oshu castle—a very specific one. Which brought me to the next oddity of the GPS. Underneath the destination was a line that I was certain did not exist there before. At least, I've never seen such a thing on a GPS. And I've seen a lot of GPSes in my time, considering my mom goes through them like tissues.

The line read, "World: Basara."

"That's…convenient," I muttered. With all of the time and space hopping we were going to be doing, it was rather nice that our modern technology would accommodate us in such a way.

"I just hope it goes back to normal at the end of all this," Flaxen didn't seem to share my sentiments. Her voice suggested that there was a long story behind how there came to be a GPS in our bandwagon, but now was not the time to ask it.

I crawled out of the wagon taking in the nice 16th(?) century soil for the first time. The air was cool here, not at all like the suffocating humidity back home. But now was not the time to enjoy that. Now was the time to put our crew together.

* * *

Getting into the castle had been surprisingly easy. I mean, considering Flaxen and I weren't superhuman fighters (we should probably make a note to ask the guys for combat lessons) and didn't have any ninja skills to sneak in with, getting into a Warlord's castle should not have been as easy as walking in through the front gate.

Scratch that, it was literally walking in through the front gate. Know that guards are very kind to horses and no one questions lone travellers.

We found who we were looking for very easily too. The castle had a nice garden with a great view and the castle's lord was currently using it to practice his swordsmanship (like I said, a great view). But never mind him for now. We weren't here to recruit the six-sword-wielding, Engrish speaking, One-Eyed Dragon of Oshu.

We were here to recruit his right eye.

Katakura Kojuro.

Target sighted.

There were many ways we could have approached Kojuro to ask him to join our crew. We could have asked for a formal meeting, introduced ourselves properly, explained our purpose, ambushed him in the fields, et cetera, et cetera.…but we were two 21st century girls who discovered we had a time-traveling bandwagon and found ourselves face to face with one of our favorite Basara figures. Diplomacy took a bit of a back seat.

"Oh my gosh, it's actually Kojuro!" I whispered to Flaxen, my voice rising several octaves in the process. She shared my giddy excitement and the two of us stood there giggling and whispering to ourselves, barely registering the level of noise we were making. Kojuro had already turned to glare at us, before evident confusion set in on his face, and Masamune, a very "shoot first, ask questions later" kind of guy, was already cursing up a storm as he approached us.

"Ok. What the hell is going on here, who are you two, and how did you get in here?" He yelled, pointing his wooden practice sword at us. This instantly quieted us up and we stood there unable to move for a second. Finally Flaxen said,

"Um, I'm FlaxenHairedSamurai and this is Fortune Maiden. The guards let us in?" she pointed to our bandwagon where the four soldiers who had been ordered to guard the gate were fawning over our horse. Masamune stared at the sight with his mouth hanging open, as Kojuro came up beside him, shaking his head.

"I thought your orders were to keep out all suspicious characters," he snapped causing them to cower in fear behind our horse. Kojuro didn't wait for them to stammer a response. He immediately turned to us.

"I don't know who you are or what you're selling. But trespassing on Lord Masamune's territory will not go unpunished." His voice was every bit as firm and intimidating as I'd imagined.

"Think they're the Weasel's spies? Only he would wear such gaudy clothes," Masamune scowled staring us up and down. Well that was just rude. We were dressed perfectly sensibly…for our time anyway. Hmm, maybe we should have stopped by a tailor's first.

"We aren't anyone's spies," I explained, "We're time-travellers. We have come from the future to right wrongs and triumph over evil!" Flaxen gave me a strange look. Masamune chuckled.

"What cheesy play did you steal that line from," he relaxed his sword slightly, "So your time-travellers, you say?"

"Lord Masamune?" Kojuro gave him a warning look. He did not look even slightly convinced. Well, couldn't blame him really. Quoting a terrible 90s dub probably wasn't the best way of introducing myself, but admittedly, it was the first thing that came to mind. That and I didn't really want to reveal our true purpose until we gathered our team, which included a lot more than just Kojuro.

"Um, yes, we came from the 21st cent—er, about 500 years from now," Flaxen explained, "We are here on a very important mission, and we were hoping we could ask Lord Kojuro to join us for this task.

"No." Their replies were simultaneous and instantaneous.

"I will only serve Lord Masamune," Kojuro stated firmly.

"Kojuro is my right eye. You can't just barge in here and demand his services for your shady time-travelling justice campaign. Go bother someone else. Like Flower Boy or Sanada. Let's go Kojuro," he turned around, urging Kojuro to follow him. Kojuro nodded gravely at us and turned to leave alongside Masamune.

"So now what?" Flaxen whispered, "Somehow that went a lot better in the PMs." No kidding. But then, when we put together our group during the planning stage, we didn't exactly extend them an invite asking them to RSVP.

…Maybe we should have.

"Maybe we should try ambushing him in the fields?" Flaxen suggested, "We could travel back a little earlier so this meeting technically doesn't happen and—"

"Yeah but…" an idea started forming in my mind, "Hold on, let me try something first." I raced ahead to catch up with the retreating Masamune.

"Hey, Big Boss, can I bend your ear for a sec?" I asked. Kojuro shook his head, but Masamune waved him off.

"It's cool. This kid's small and unarmed. She tries anything funny, I can handle it," he boasted. I should have taken offense, but unfortunately he was right. We left our weapons in the bandwagon.

I gestured for Masamune to come closer so I could whisper into his ear with anyone else overhearing. He looked amused at my determination, but the amusement quickly faded as soon as he heard what I had to say.

"Are you sure? Is that even possible?"

"Yep, you help us out by lending us Kojuro, and we'll be sure to do it. We can even come back here to let you have the first strike." Masamune looked deep in thought for a moment, as he contemplated my offer.

"No kidding, eh?" he whistled.

"Lord Masamune?" Kojuro was already looking weary, and for a moment, I feared for my own safety. Behind me, Flaxen looked on curiously.

Suddenly Masamune grinned. "I have a better idea," he said and called out to the men in the garden, "Alright boys, pack your stuff. We're going on a field trip!"

The Date Men started cheering before they realized they had no idea what he was talking about. Then they exchanged confused looks.

Only Kojuro understood right away. "Lord Masamune, surely you don't believe—you can't be serious!"

"Aw don't be such a stick in the mud, Kojuro," the One-Eyed Dragon's eyes flashed mischievously, "I can't say I'm not a little curious about these kids' claims. And if we can really settle that unfinished business, all the better." He shoved his wooden sword in Kojuro's arms. "I'm going to get dressed. All of you'd better be ready when I get back." The Date Men cheered again, while Kojuro just sighed.

Flaxen came up to me confused. "What did you say to him?" she asked.

"I may have hinted to him about one of our top priority goals in this adventure."

"You mean…" she mouthed the rest of the sentence. I nodded. Flaxen stared at Masamune's retreating figure in amazement. "That certainly explains why he's suddenly so fired up, but…" she looked at the four Date Men making themselves comfortable in the bandwagon. "This may prove to cause a spacing issue later."

"Oh," Now that I thought about it, our initial group was to have 9 people including ourselves. With Masamune and his men tagging along that number instantly shot up to 14. I looked at the bandwagon again.

"I think we'll be fine as long as no one else joins," I said after a while, sincerely believing those words.

Kojuro just continued staring at us, likely wondering if this was some sort of trap or crazy dream.

That's when Flaxen remembered our other purpose for coming here.

"Hey, Kojuro? Can we borrow a horse?"

* * *

Destination: Kaga

With our two handlebar-wearing horses (because Masamune insisted) and the entire Dragon of Oshu safely (and loudly) in tow, our next stop was Kaga to pick up our adorable team mascot (and his handler). Kojuro was seated at the box, with Flaxen beside him to explain how to work the time machine and me stuck at the back with five more people than we'd expected.

I thought the bandwagon was big enough when Flaxen brought it, but now I was starting to have my doubts.

"So if I understand correctly, we need to drive at a speed of 88 miles per hour, and then this little box here," Kojuro pointed at the GPS, "will take us where we need to go."

"Yep," Flaxen nodded, "I've already set our destination, so you can just floor it."

"Right," Kojuro didn't seem convinced, "How fast is 88 miles per hour exactly?"

I groaned. Oh right, American measurements didn't exist yet.

"Er, it's about 140 kilometers, give or take a little," Flaxen explained after a little mental math.

"…What's a kilometer?"

And British measurements weren't in use in Sengoku Basara Japan. Hmm this was going to be harder than I thought.

Fortunately, Masamune chose this moment to speak up. "Kojuro, just go already. Once you hit whatever speed you need, whatever needs to happen will happen anyway. Come on, I want to see this thing in action!" Hmm, maybe Masamune would have his uses after all.

Once Kojuro heard his Lord's demands, he snapped to attention, holding up the reigns. "Yes, Lord Masamune!" he yelled and brought them down.

We were off!

* * *

Our swift and timely arrival at the Maeda castle quickly convinced our skeptics that this was in fact a time machine and instantly raised the excitement levels of all present. Masamune's eye was sparkling like a kid's at a candy store as he immediately figured out what sort of potential our bandwagon had, and he was already calling together a war council for that purpose.

He could conquer Japan on his own time; right now we had more important things to do.

"So that's the story," Flaxen explained to Maeda Keiji, as Yumekichi ran up and down her arm playfully. Unlike a certain someone who pointed a wooden sword at us, Keiji was a lot more accepting of our story. It may have had something to do with the fact that when our bandwagon appeared out of nowhere, it nearly ran him over, but that was beside the point. The point was that Keiji believed us, and he was quite eager to join us.

"A trip like this sounds like a great adventure," he said, "Count me in." Leaving Yumekichi with Flaxen, he quickly climbed into the bandwagon. "Hey there Masamune, Katakura, Date Men. Long time no see!"

"Hey there Flower Boy," Masamune looked up at him, "So they roped you in as well."

"Haha, I'm always up for an adventure, you know me," he looked around shiftily, barely acknowledging that Yumekichi had jumped back on his shoulder, "So how does this thing work anyway?"

"Who knows? We just hit a really fast speed and _Whoosh!_ Here we are," Masamune leaned over to the font of the wagon, where I had taken a seat next to Kojuro (since Flaxen wanted to sit in the back with Yumekichi this time). "By the way, can I drive?"

"No!" Flaxen and I snapped, a feeling of impending doom upon us. There was a reason it was Kojuro and not Masamune that we had invited after all.

"I believe it would be best if I took the lead for now Lord Masamune," Kojuro explained, likely feeling the same sense of doom, "This is…harder than it looks." Masamune looked like he wanted to argue, but something else caught his attention. "Maeda, why are you looking around so much?"

Keiji laughed nervously, "Oh no reason, you know." He straightened up, which only made it more suspicious. "Let's just get going, we have a few others to recruit as well don't we?"

"Yeah, that's true," Flaxen shrugged and we exchanged nods. I had just finished inputting our next destination, when there was suddenly a loud crash behind us.

"Uh oh," Keiji muttered and Yumekichi facepalmed.

"What was that?" Flaxen asked trying to turn around, but Keiji quickly moved to the back of the wagon holding his arms up to block the view.

"Nothing, nothing, let's go already."

Experience says that the more someone denies something, the bigger the issue is. Because of that, we were all curious.

"Oi, Flower Boy, what did you do?" Masamune asked at the same time that one of his men (the one with the pompadour) yelled,

"Boss, there's a woman with a deadly aura wielding a naginata approaching behind us!" It took us .5 seconds to understand who that was.

"Drive, drive!" I yelled to Kojuro, who immediately jerked the reigns to make the horses run. The last thing we heard as we left Kaga was Matsu yelling about spices in her husband's food…

* * *

Destination: Kai

"So you guys are time-travellers from 500 years in the future and you want me to join your group and help you fulfill your vague and only slightly hinted at mission?" Sarutobi Sasuke asked as soon as we had finished explaining everything (with marginally helpful inputs from Keiji and Masamune).

"Yep, it'll be fun," I gave him my best innocent smile in hopes that it would convince him. Flaxen and I had decided that a ninja was an absolute necessity. After screening the potential candidates, we decided that Sasuke was the universal best choice. Some members of our group complained, but it was ultimately out of their hands.

Figures he'd drive the hardest bargain though.

"And this bandwagon thing actually works?" the question was directed at Kojuro, who after driving it through time twice could only shrug and nod. "And _you're_ going along with this?" Another shrug and nod.

"I don't know," Sasuke drawled, "I'm perfectly happy here serving Lord Shingen and Master Sana—"

"SHH!" we suddenly shushed him gesturing at Masamune, who was currently being distracted by his retainers. We had all agreed that if we wanted to get in and out of Kai without any incident, we would need to keep Masamune sufficiently distracted so that he wouldn't try to go settle any rivalries. So far it was working, but he had ears like a hawk, so it was imperative that we didn't mention a certain name. Sasuke glanced at Masamune and rolled his eyes.

"Yeah like I said, I'm perfectly happy here in this nice peaceful—

That sentence was interrupted by a decidedly not nice or peaceful _"YOU FOOL!"_ which was followed by a loud _"BOOM!"_ and was further followed by a very loud _"RIP!"_

All of us stood there stunned. Except Sasuke who looked mildly surprised and confused before his expression settled on annoyed.

"Yeah, on second thought, I could use a change of scenery." He remarked and jumped into the bandwagon unenthusiastically. "Hey," he called out to one of his hidden ninjas, "Tell Lord Shingen and Master You-Know-Who, I'm going on a short vacation. I'll be back soon, maybe." The hidden ninja understood and went to go deliver the message. Probably. We think. He remained hidden the whole time after all.

As Sasuke stretched out in the bandwagon, Flaxen whispered to me, "Was that the sound of a screen ripping?"

"Looks like we were right," I whispered back, as the bandwagon once again started moving.

* * *

Destination: Orochi-Verse Campsite.

"Huh?" Flaxen asked as she read the screen. "Why'd you set a course for here?" Everyone else had crawled out to look around this new area.

It had to be said: We weren't in Basara-Japan anymore.

"I wasn't sure where to find him in Warriors-Japan, and this is the ultimate Everyone Lives AU. He's perfectly healthy here, I think, and he's an experienced time-traveller already, so it'll be easier to explain everything." That explanation worked for Flaxen, who finally jumped out of the wagon.

"So where do we find him?"

"Um…let's just start walking around, I'm sure we'll run into him soon."

* * *

"Okay, new plan. Sasuke, can you find a small boy wearing white robes and a white and gold beret? He should have a giant compass with him."

"And maybe some cats."

* * *

We _(FINALLY)_ found Takenaka Hanbei lounging in the staff quarters, surrounded by books, and a cat in his lap. Why we didn't think to look there first was truly a mystery.

Hanbei looked up from his book as we entered, and smiled. It was almost as if he were expecting us.

"Hi there," he called out to us, "I don't think I've seen you in this camp before. Are you guys new or just visiting?" His voice was light and cheerful but it was clear that he was intensely studying our every move.

"We're just visiting," I explained smiling shyly. Flaxen nudged me to continue. "M-my friend Flaxen and I are time-travellers from the future and we were hoping you would join us in our mission."

"Hmm? Okay!"

"Um, it's a very important mission. We have detected some unforgivable incidents that need to be corrected and—

"Um, Fortune, he already agreed," Flaxen told me. Sure enough, Hanbei was laughing at my stammering.

"Yeah, yeah, you don't need to convince me anymore. You guys are from the Mystic Realm right?"

"Ah well, no actually," Flaxen admitted sheepishly. Hanbei raised a brow at this.

"Oh? Now my curiosity's really been piqued. Two strangely dressed girls arrive in our little camp, in a horse-drawn wagon with several strange men in tow, including one that looks exactly like our Lord Masamune. This really looks interesting now."

"Hmm, I guess we are a weird bun—hang on, how did you know about that. You haven't seen the bandwagon. It's on the other end of this camp." Flaxen's eyes widened.

"I'm the All-Knowing Hanbei," he smirked mischievously, getting up to stretch. The cat jumped down from his lap and ran off. Aww, I was hoping I could ask to pet it.

Hanbei walked past us, outside the tent (where Sasuke was waiting patiently with his arms crossed) before turning around and adding, "The cats told me."

We exchanged looks with Sasuke who just shrugged.

Huh….Guess he really was expecting us.

* * *

"Alright everyone, meet Takenaka Hanbei. Hanbei, meet everyone," I announced after we'd reunited in our wagon. Hanbei cheerfully introduced himself, while everyone else just stared at him in shock.

"Takenaka…Hanbei, you say?" Kojuro repeated the name slowly, icily. I froze.

"He looks…different than I remember," Masamune narrowed his eyes, "But then again I never saw him without the mask. Hey Flower Boy, you two knew each other for a long time right? Is this Takenaka as a kid?"

"How rude. I'm not a kid," Hanbei mock-pouted, "And I've never met any of you in my life. You guys must be from another world."

"Another…world?"

"Don't worry about it," Hanbei waved the question away, "Even if there is another Takenaka Hanbei in your world, he's not me, so it's best if you just nod and go with it." I knew it was a good idea to bring Hanbei. "Nod and go with it" was practically a motto for their own world, so they understood that advice well.

They nodded and went with it.

"So how does this thing work?" Hanbei asked, "If you're not from the Mystic Realm, you're following a different set of rules right?"

"Yep, we just set our destination to our satnav, and once we hit a certain speed, we're there." Flaxen explained.

"Satnav—never mind. But what's the power source of this thing?" Maybe it wasn't a good idea to bring Hanbei. He asked too many logical questions.

"Just nod and go with it," Sasuke parroted sarcastically. As the only sane man of his world, he had naturally been filled with curiosity at first too, but he had already stopped questioning it. Hanbei didn't seem too happy about having to take his own advice, but he quickly changed the subject.

"So is this everyone?"

"Not just yet," Flaxen told him, "There's still one more clan we need to visit. Next stop, the Odas!"

"THE ODAS?" The protests were barely audible over the sound of the horses' hooves.


	3. Chapter 3

**And we're back! Did you miss us? Did ya? Oh moo to you then! Neither I nor Fortune Maiden own either Samurai Warriors or Sengoku Basara. We do however own the bandwagon until I have to take it back and cash in on the security deposit! **

**This chapter written by yours truly.**

* * *

**Chapter 3**

* * *

Spiders. Large snakes. Freddy from Elm Street. I'd faced them all, never afraid to admit to being scared. But the one time I was truly terrified, my throat closed up.

After a glare filled journey, during which Fortune sat in the box with Kojuro, I'd talked myself through what I was going to say. How I would act. Even how much eye contact I should use. Truthfully, I'd been preparing for this moment for a long time, fighting every part of me that even tried to speak sense.

"You okay?" Fortune's voice brought me out of my thoughts, and back in front of our new destination. Behind me, I could hear a few of the bandwagon's occupants complaining again, only to be shushed by Keiji and Hanbei. "We could always go grab the other set."

"Nah, then there _would_ be a riot." Snorting lightly to myself, I forced my feet forward ignoring the startled looks around me, stopping only when one of the on duty guards had the tip of his sword at my throat.

"State your business, strange garbed woman!" Yeah, we should really hurry and get changed.

"I wish to speak to Lord Oda. I-I have information he may find useful."

Furrowing his brow, the guard didn't let the sword drop, until he took note of the crossbow on my back. "Leave your weapons at the door. If you are merely here to waste time, Lord Oda will deal with you himself."

Nodding furiously, I unstrapped the bolt bag and crossbow, dropping them in the bandwagon. As I turned to leave, Masamune grabbed my wrist, "Are you sure we can trust this Oda?"

"More than we can trust yours." I smiled, already running back to where Fortune was waiting for me.

* * *

The smell of incense was thick in the air, pricking hard at my nose. Next to me, Fortune sneezed, a small reminder I wasn't alone here. "How long do you think we have until they get bored?"

"When there's an explosion from outside, then we know it's time to cut our losses." With that little joke out of the way, the tension certainly eased up, just as footsteps began to approach the meeting room. I tensed up, feeling my hands form into tightly locked fists as the door was opened. Against my better judgement, I risked glancing upwards, freezing almost instantaneously.

Tall, proud and intimidating were the only words my mind could form, watching Nobunaga breeze past us to stand at the front of the room. I could briefly feel Fortune's eyes on me, urging me to speak. _So much for rehearsing. _

"We wish to extend an invitation to you, Lord Oda." Fortune started, her voice filling the room with ease. "Forgive my friend, she has been looking forward to meeting you for some time now."

"Is that so? What kind of an invitation?"

"T-Time travel." I finally stuttered out, internally wincing at the pathetic sound trying to pass itself as my voice. "Not that you have much of a choice. There's an army marching here as we speak; intent on taking your head."

Now _that_ had been an interesting conversation topic back on the bandwagon. Between dodging questions from Masamune, many of which were about the man standing before me, and thinking about this meeting, I'd been focusing on the first time I ever even heard Nobunaga's name.

* * *

_June, 1582. Honno-Ji, Kyoto. Betrayed by his retainer Mitsuhide Akechi, Nobunaga Oda was swallowed in the flames of history._

* * *

"An army you say? Under whose banner do they march against Nobunaga?"

Now or never. I suppose the worst case scenario was that he refused, and I'd be left to ambush him in the fie- Wait, that was the Kojuro back up plan. I _knew_ I was forgetting something! Of all the knuckleheaded, idiotic...okay breathe. I'll just adjust the plan a little. Ambush him on the _battlefield, _that should do it! Yeah. I should come up with plans all the time, especially on the spur of the moment. "Uh, Flaxen? You still in there?"

Snapping out of my planning reverie, I noticed two things. One, Nobunaga was gone and Two, Fortune was throwing me a look similar to the one I gave her when she was stuttering around Hanbei...oh dear. "Did I fangirl over him?"

"Nope, but you kinda zoned out, so I explained the situation. He's gone to find Lady Noh and Ranmaru now."

Groaning, I threw myself backwards, much to Fortune's delight. "I'll make you a deal. I don't tease you about Hanbei, and what happened here never leaves this room."

"Deal."

* * *

Well, whilst Nobunaga was warning the guards of Akechi's treachery, and making sure they would put up a good fight, worthy of Nobunaga, I was left appeasing the masses so to speak. If I was a liar, I'd say that the Date guys were discrete in their gawping as Nohime was helped into the wagon, but my mum did a good job keeping that habit firmly non-existent. I spotted the usual confusion over Ranmaru's exact gender, but the matter wasn't really pressed.

"We're certain that these Odas won't try to kill everyone?" Sasuke asked in a low tone, pulling me into the back as he did.

"They're not angels." I admitted, "But they're not the monsters you know."

Once we were properly seated in the bandwagon, and Kojuro started getting us out of there, Fortune took the satnav, inputting the next destination. "Ready to finally start fixing history you guys?"

"Now we're talking!" Hanbei cheered, inadvertently causing Nobunaga to give one of the greatest expressions I'd seen outside of comedies. It was a cross between disbelief and astonishment. From now on I will label it the 'Holy-(insert divine being here)-my-subordinate's-strategist-who-died-three-years-ago-is-actually-alive-and-sitting-in-front-of-me' expression. Maybe I should work on the label. Hanbei should be able to help seeing as he's the one causing it. "Ah well, nice seeing you again Lord Nobunaga! And always a pleasure to see you, my Lady!"

The satnav's computerised voice broke Nobunaga out of it, his head whipping round when it announced the destination was set. Once Kojuro had taken it back, I recovered my crossbow, loading a bolt in preparation.

"Where are we going?" Keiji yelled over the horses.

"Nagashino. In your world." Nodding to me, Fortune took position at the side of the wagon, hanging her arms over. "Sasuke, I'm going to need a hand."

* * *

Once the light had died down, and we were no longer blinded, the Basara crew and the Odas quickly took cover, which meant that for the two minutes we would be near another Masamune and Kojuro, we were going driverless. Don't want to mess up the time stream too badly, right?

Nonetheless, we were on a rescue mission, and hopefully we'd be able to prevent a large chunk of emotional scarring for one character.

The plan was that before dropping down into the wagon again, Kojuro would get us in close, at a speed fast enough to avoid most of the bullets, but not so fast that we wouldn't be able to grab Nagamasa. "And why are we saving my brother in law?" Nobunaga asked, not fazed at all by his first time travelling experience. Which I shouldn't be too surprised at, but y'know, these guys didn't experience much technology.

"Because in this world, Mitsuhide is a backstabbing sociopath, who kills him with the rifles that were supposed to help Tokugawa against the Uesugi and Takeda." Fortune explained, her fists opening and closing in anticipation.

"Not to mention he does it in front of your little sister, which causes her to become some kind of a dark sorceress, which admittedly helps her grow a spine and kill your wife, no offence my Lady. But before she can kill you, you put a bullet in her, just as Sanada Yukimura and Date Masamune show up. In other words, we're trying to prevent a scary Oichi."

If my information overload was well, overloading, no-one blinked. Though, that could also have something to do with the fact that Kojuro and Masamune had leapt into the wagon, a hand still on the reins. "Get ready!"

The next few seconds passed somewhat in a breeze, but Fortune and Sasuke managed to grab Nagamasa, helmet and all, whilst I took my shot at Mitsuhide. It went wide, but provided enough of a distraction for us to get out of there. With steady hands, Kojuro urged the horses forwards, the flash of light coming quicker this time, Nagamasa dropping to the ground safely.

Massaging their arms, Fortune and Sasuke fell back against the side, breathing again. "I think it's time to open those snacks." Keiji smirked, already searching through the bag. As the wagon returned to some semblance of order, with Kojuro returning to his driving position with Ranmaru next to him as navigator, I put my crossbow back in the case. My eyes met Fortune's, and I grinned, bursting into laughter. Within a second she'd joined me, leaving the others to stare blankly at us.

"Well everyone," I started, calming down again, "Welcome to the Time Travelling Bandwagon Extravaganza!"

* * *

**Bonus Scene- While Flaxen and Fortune continue the recruiting, the members of the bandwagon muse over security.**

"I'm surprised at how much resistance the guards gave them over entering the temple," Keiji said, stretching out into the temporarily available space.

"I know. Don't those guys know of the ancient proverb?" Hanbei remarked indignantly, "Guards must be kind to horses and never question lone travelers."

"Takenaka, Maeda," Kojuro, ever the voice of reason, grumbled, "Just what part of "lone travelers" does our bandwagon of time-travelers, feudal lords, retainers, vagabonds, ninjas, and strategists fit?"

An uneasy silence passed through the wagon as the occupants processed that bit of information.

Finally, Sasuke spoke, "Well so much for that gag."

The others agreed.


	4. Chapter 4

**We now return to your not so regularly scheduled Bandwagon Madness! However, we do have a few things to announce: **

**1\. We don't own Basara, Warriors or the bandwagon we are using (that one's a rental) **

**2\. The characters we are using from the Samurai Warriors world will be their SW3 incarnations, unless explicitly stated otherwise. The reason for this is that we came up with a lot of this stuff loooong before either of us was familiar with the SW4 cast. (And on that note, since neither of us has played any Sengoku Basara games and Judge End hadn't been released at the time of these early adventures, we will only be referencing the Production IG Anime for now.),**

**3\. If you haven't watched Season 2 of Sengoku Basara or the movie...be warned, MEGA spoilers ahead. **

**This chapter was brought to you by Fortune.**

* * *

In which plans are made, and theories are proposed...

* * *

"The Time Travelling Bandwagon Extravaganza," Sasuke repeated slowly, a look of incredulity on his face. This expression matched the faces of some of our more serious party members, including Ranmaru, Kojuro, and surprisingly, Masamune.

"Mm, the name could use some work," he remarked.

"I agree," Hanbei nodded thoughtfully, "It's quite a mouthful."

Flaxen scowled. "It's a working title! If you have something better, let's hear it." No one offered any suggestions.

"I kinda like it," Keiji shrugged, "It has a nice ring to it. Sounds very…"

"Extravagant?" Nobunaga offered.

"Yeah, exactly!"

And so the issue of our group name was quickly shoved aside in favor of more important topics: Lunch.

We parked our time machine in an open field and shuffled out to stretch our legs. A nice walk in an empty field felt good after a job well done, even if not everyone in our group fully appreciated what we just did.

Saving Nagamasa and Oichi from their Mitsuhide-induced fates was one of those things that would really serve us in the long run, even though we weren't yet sure what that long run was exactly. The true goal of this adventure, which I'd revealed to Masamune to get his retainer—I mean, cooperation, was still a ways off. For starters, we had no idea where (or rather, _when_) to start looking.

The horses were also in need of a break after so much time hopping, so it was probably best if we resolved anything we could in this period before moving on to the next place.

Most of the fellas decided to have an impromptu picnic and indulge in all of the snacks we brought back from the future. It was particularly amusing to see Ranmaru desperately try to insist he didn't have a sweet tooth while hoarding a small pile of treats for himself. Keiji and Masamune ribbed him about it endlessly, while Nobunaga, Noh, Sasuke, and Kojuro had their own discussion. The two Basara characters seemed fairly tense, as if uncertain that the Nobunaga we recruited wasn't going to stab them in the back at some point.

Admittedly, that probably was a reasonable concern, but as long as Flaxen and I were in charge there would be no backstabbing allowed. Unless of course, someone got the bright idea to betray _us_ first, in which case, we would counter beautifully.

With the Date Men enjoying themselves as well, that left only two people unaccounted for: Flaxen and Hanbei. Worried that Ran wouldn't leave them any snacks if this continued, I set out to find them.

* * *

"This is incredible!" For someone who had a reputation of being a lazy strategist, Hanbei was displayed an overabundance of energy as he repeatedly circled the bandwagon examining every minute detail of it. Flaxen stood to the side, unable to get a word in. When she saw me, she quickly pulled me over.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Remind me why you wanted to grab a Hanbei who had experience in time-travel?" she asked, her eye twitching.

"_Because_ he had experience in time-travel?" I answered unsurely, "Was that a bad thing?

"Very."

"Why?"

"Oh hey there Fortune," Hanbei jumped down from the wagon and ran up to me excited, "Great timing, maybe you can answer some questions for me."

"Um…okay?" I wasn't really sure how to answer seeing as Hanbei was giving me a kid-in-a-candy-store expression and Flaxen was vigorously shaking her head behind him, silently yelling "NO!"

Let it be known that I am weak to kid-in-a-candy-store expressions.

"Great, now then, let's start with the horses," he said gesturing not so much to them as to Masamune's decorations for them. "Please explain the significance of the armor."

_Huh?_

"The what of the what now?" I blinked.

"The blue Lord Masamune called them handlebars and exhaust pipes," Hanbei clarified, "I want to know how they affect the horses' performances." I suppose that was a logical response considering handlebars and exhaust pipes didn't exist in—wait, what did any of that have to do anything?

"The All-Knowing Hanbei wishes to know exactly how our bandwagon works," Flaxen finally explained with a heavy sigh. "I've answered enough of his questions, and I'm starving. Your turn." She made her exit a little too quickly for comfort.

Oh well. How hard could it be to explain a machine that probably runs entirely on deus ex machina power?

"The "armor" does absolutely nothing," I told him, "Masamune insisted on it for style reasons. He said he wouldn't be caught dead in an unstylish horse, and we really needed Kojuro to join us. So we compromised."

"Hmm, the Right Eye of the Dragon for a few weird horse accessories...I think it's a fair trade," Hanbei agreed with a shrug. "Now then what about the satnav?"

"How do you even know that word?"

"Flaxen called it that," he said dismissively and crawled into the box of the bandwagon to get a better look, "How does this work exactly?"

"Ah well, in this case, we just put in the destination we want and it automatically gets us to where we need to go." That probably was the best explanation under the circumstances. It's not like the stream of time (and space) was a paved road for the GPS to yell, "Turn right" every five seconds. As soon as we hit 88mph, there was a bright flash of light and a few minutes later we were where we needed to be. Hmm, I can't say I really understood what happened in those few minutes.

"How very mysterious…and the speed of travel is…"

"Oh yeah, that I got from a movie," I laughed. He gave me a puzzled look, but to my surprise he didn't question it. Hmm considering where we pulled Hanbei from, I wouldn't be surprised if he got to know all about the future from the Anegawa created by the Hydra's power. I made a note to ask him about that later.

"Hey…let's try it out," Hanbei suddenly said with a sly grin.

"Huh?"

"Come on, get in the wagon," he urged me, "I want to test something." I began to understand what left Flaxen so drained. Hanbei was really hard to keep up with.

"I don't think that's a good idea," I stammered, "I mean…I can't even drive!" This had the desired effect of deflating Hanbei's enthusiasm.

For about three seconds anyway.

* * *

"Hanbei, what are _they_ doing here?"

Three seconds after Hanbei's enthusiasm deflated, he suddenly perked up and ran off. He returned shortly afterwards dragging a very reluctant Ranmaru by the arm, and trailed by a very amused Nobunaga. I had a bad feeling about this.

"Good, you haven't run off anywhere. Fortune, meet our driver. Oh and Lord Nobunaga wanted to join us as well." Nobunaga nodded and walked right past me into the bandwagon. Ranmaru finally wriggled free.

"Lord Hanbei, what are you up to? Why are you sneaking around behind Lady Flaxen's back already? Why do you need me for this?"

Oh yes. I really had a bad feeling about this.

Hanbei's plan was very simple. For whatever reason, Hanbei really wanted to take a joy ride on the time machine to better understand how it worked. Apparently, he was perfectly content with going with the flow when there was a flow to go with, but now that we were taking a lunch break, he had a burning curiosity to satiate.

This curiosity involved taking a quick trip to any point in time and then coming back. He didn't explain anything else.

"What about the horses?" I whined, sandwiched in-between Hanbei and Nobunaga. Ranmaru sat up front with the reigns in hand, and his weary expression mirrored mine. However, seeing as his Lord was one of the ringleaders for this plan, he had little protest (which I assume is the whole reason Hanbei invited Nobunaga).

"Don't worry, I checked them over and they look perfectly fine," Hanbei insisted. "Besides, we're just going there and back."

"Where is _there_?"

"Your future," Nobunaga laughed, "Let us see what became of Nobunaga's Japan." Didn't Flaxen and I already explain the whole Honnouji Incident to him? Did he really believe us?

I just stared as he continued.

"Rejoice Oran. We can pick up more of those confectionaries while we are there." Ranmaru's ears turned red and Hanbei and I stifled a laugh.

"That is not necessary, my Lord," he insisted and cleared his throat, "Alright. The destination has been set. Please hold on tight…"

* * *

Nothing happened.

The horses ran across the field with all of their speed and strength, we most certainly hit the intended speed (according to the GPS which at least still had some of its normal functions), but all we got for our trouble was a trip across the field.

"Interesting," Hanbei said thoughtfully.

I was just stunned. Why didn't it work? Did we use up our quota for the day? Was the GPS broken? Were the horses too tired?

Were we _stuck_?

"What happened?" Ranmaru was trying very hard to keep his voice steady, "Why are we still here?"

"Oh yeah, well," Hanbei yawned, "Let's go back first. You can travel at a normal speed this time. I'll explain on the way."

"Hanbei, did you know this would happen?" Nobunaga was not amused.

"Mm, fifty-fifty really," Hanbei admitted, "I don't know much about time-travel except what the Mystics were nice enough to reveal, but I suspect the way our bandwagon works isn't completely different from their methods."

"Oh?" Nobunaga stroked his chin thoughtfully. Judging by the weary look Ranmaru was giving us, and my own confusion, I think it was safe to assume that only Nobunaga was on the same page as our experienced time-traveller.

"From what I've seen and the others told me, it doesn't appear that we are travelling to certain people's pasts, so it is safe to assume that we are not bound in where we want to go."

"Yes?" I think I understood that part anyway.

"But I want to know what actually makes this completely ordinary piece of farm equipment capable of traversing the time stream," Hanbei said, "I do have a theory but I still need to run a few more tests…once the horses get some rest anyway."

"What is this theory?" Nobunaga pressed, but his tone of voice suggested that he might have had one too.

"I believe that someone in our bandwagon—not Fortune clearly, has some sort of tie to the Mystic Realm. And that is the source of the bandwagon's powers."

* * *

I didn't have much time to dwell on Hanbei's words. As soon as we got back, we were met by an irritated Sasuke, who'd been tasked with finding us for the first ever Bandwagon meeting.

I'd completely forgotten about it. Earlier, Flaxen and I agreed that once we gathered our team and performed our first feat of time travel magic, we would gather everyone around, and reveal our true purpose for this adventure. Masamune already knew, and he was grinning wildly while everyone around him debated on whether or not that grin meant anything good.

"Where were you guys?" Flaxen asked me, pulling me beside her, "We were waiting forever."

"It's a long story," I said and glanced at Hanbei, hoping he'd explain. But he had already lost interest and took his seat beside Keiji. "Let's talk about that later, and get started with this meeting." I didn't want to ruin the festive mood by casually mentioning that we _might_ be stuck here.

Flaxen shrugged and called everyone to attention. "Alright guys, I'm sure you're all wondering by now why we dragged you guys out of your peaceful—and in Lord Nobunaga's case, doomed—worlds to travel with us across time and space."

We were met with mostly blank and disinterested faces…and Masamune's creepy grin.

I continued, "It has come to our attention, that some of you have been cheated! The universe around you has allowed some heinous things to go unpunished!"

Now this got everyone's attention. Nothing like a little bit of an overly dramatic statement to make everyone think about how much their lives sucked. I continued, "Now then, we've saved Nagamasa from a traumatizing death and have already taken care of Nobunaga—by the way, did you make sure to tell the guards how to greet Mitsuhide when he got there?"

Nobunaga's thunderous laugh echoed across the field. "Of course!"

Flaxen stared at me. "What did you tell him?" she asked. Oh yeah, she was spaced out when I gave him those instructions. I grinned and turned to Nobunaga.

"When Mitsuhide turns up to kill me, the guards are to say "Thank you Mitsuhide, but your Warlord is in another temple"," Nobunaga laughed again, clearly entertained. Around him were some snickers, some groans, and Ranmaru being unsure of which response was more appropriate.

"You didn't," Flaxen's eyes were wide.

"I couldn't resist! Anyway, let's move on to more important things. Gentlemen and Lady Noh, we have summoned you all here to help us get rid of the worst villain known to Basara."

"Nobunaga?" Keiji asked glancing at the non-Basara version to Ranmaru's annoyance.

"Mori Motonari?" Sasuke offered.

"That white haired guy with the mask?" One of the Date men spoke up.

"Bzzt. Wrong," Masamune stood up, "Can I do the honors?" We nodded. "Boys and Other Demon King's Wife, our target is that twisted bard, Matsunaga Hisahide!"

The effect was instantaneous. Everyone who knew whom we were talking about was instantly enraged and energized for time-travel induced retribution, even Keiji. Already we could hear all sorts of creative plans for how to properly punish the smug villain.

On the other hand, the Odas and Hanbei wore blank looks.

"Matsunaga Hisahide," Hanbei considered the name, "I know I've heard it."

"He was one of your retainers my Lord, was he not?" Ranmaru asked.

"Indeed," Nobunaga stroked his mustache, "He owned a most exquisite tea kettle."

"Which he blew himself up with, if I recall correctly," Noh shrugged, "A pity, I guess. But I don't recall him doing anything particularly punishment worthy. In fact I don't think I would even be able to tell him apart from most of our other retainers."

"Consider yourselves lucky!" A Date man cried, "He's the worst!"

"Just about everything bad can be traced back to him somehow," Sasuke added.

"_Everything_." Keiji repeated bitterly.

"And he always gets away with it too," Masamune explained and punched his open palm, "Oh I'm really getting fired up now. I'll drag that bastard to the deepest levels of hell myself if I have to." Kojuro nodded.

The others considered it. Hanbei spoke up. "Ah, for the uninformed, I don't suppose you have a list of those crimes, so we can get a better idea of who we're dealing with."

"That we do," Flaxen smiled and pulled out a sheet of paper from her pocket. She cleared her throat, "Here is a list of things Matsunaga Hisahide needs to be tied to a chair for punishment for: Capturing the Date Men, Almost killing said men, ransoming the aforementioned men, poisoning the guy bringing the ransom, almost killing the guys bringing the rest of the ransom, not staying around to have his butt kicked, not having the decency to stay dead _after blowing himself up_, kicking Hideyoshi and Keiji when they were down—

"Believe me, _that_ really came back to bite _everyone_!" Keiji sighed sadly. I picked up the list to give Flaxen a moment to breathe.

"Threatening to beat Kojuro within an inch of his life, using him as bait to lure Masamune, not _actually_ using him as bait and nearly blowing up Masamune instead—

"Yeah and there was also whatever past beef he had with Chosokabe," Masamune added, "I don't know the details, but I bet you anything they ain't pretty." Flaxen grabbed the list back and continued reading, her hands gripping the page tightly.

"Moving on, he _stole Nobunaga's skull, DRANK SAKE FROM THAT SKULL, AND HAD THE AUDACITY TO SURVIVE SEASON TWO WITHOUT ANY KIND OF PUNISHMENT!"_

"If you want to get technical, he didn't just survive Season 2, he _caused _it," I grumbled, "And he didn't even show up in the movie so we can just assume he got away with it all. Ah I suppose he double-crossed Hanbei and Hideyoshi too, but since they have their own rap sheet, we can probably let that one slide."

"Except for the part where I was attacked by his ninja," Sasuke pointed out.

"Alright, I'll add _that_ part to the list." I promised.

With all of Matsunaga's crimes out in the open, the mood was very heavy. Ranmaru reacted to the part about the skull the same way as Flaxen and was now actively contributing to the creative punishment discussion.

Noh seemed more surprised than anything…but not so much at the list as her husband's reaction to it. "My Lord?" she asked. Nobunaga was smiling.

"What an interesting character," he mused.

"That is exactly what the Demon King of our world said," Kojuro noted, "When he decided to let him live leading to all but one item on that list."

"Ah so then, most everything can be traced back to Lord Nobunaga then?" Hanbei remarked with a sly smirk, "Still, that's a really long list. And I don't think I like that part about my counterpart being double-crossed. "

"If it's any consolation, I don't think your counterpart really cared," I told him.

The debating and discussion over Matsunaga ceased when Masamune yelled out, "Hey ladies, so what's the plan for capturing that bastard?"

"Ah…" Flaxen thought about it carefully, "We don't really have one right now." The looks of horror and disbelieve we receive were truly comical. "We're open to ideas though!"

"What do you mean you don't have a plan?" Kojuro snapped, "Look at your list. Pick a destination and let's go pick him up from one of them."

"I say let's go to my past," Keiji said, "We can prevent a whole season of heartache."

"That's definitely something we have on our list of fixing," I told him, "But there's not much point in punishing that Matsunaga."

"Yeah, he hadn't had a chance to _do _anything yet," Sasuke explained, "We need to grab the one that disappears after filching that sword from Osaka Castle."

"But unfortunately, he _disappears_." Kojuro stressed, "And we were all focused on more immediate things to pay attention to where he went."

And so we were stumped. There wasn't much point in punishing an innocent Matsunaga (oxymoronic as that was), but we didn't have any idea where to find him. Or even how to punish him. The guy was an expert in coming back from the dead. We needed some way to make it stick.

After some more unsuccessful brainstorming, Hanbei said, "By the way, you mentioned a list of things you want to fix. What else is on that list?"

"We wanted to save Lord Nobunaga from Honnouji," Flaxen began, "We saved Nagamasa, preventing Oichi's breakdown…I hope this prevents her death at Azuchi later too."

"She survives that though, so not much point in fixing it," Sasuke pointed out.

"Preventing the other Nobunaga's death would be nice t—

"NO." Sasuke, Keiji, Masamune, Kojuro and the Date men barked.

"And why not?" Ranmaru demanded with narrow eyes.

"Hello, what part of "Demon King of the Sixth Heaven" sounds like a description for a nice guy to you?" Masamune snapped and gestured at our Nobunaga, "Just because this one looks like some sort of singing fool doesn't mean ours is like that too."

"…Is that so?" Nobunaga's singsong voice was just a little less melodic that time.

"That man cannot be reasoned with," Keiji agreed, "When we say "Demon King", we mean "Demon King". He has crazy demon-y powers and everything."

"Huh, then it sounds like you need an exorcist," Noh laughed. That gave us pause.

"Hmm, an exorcist," I considered it thoughtfully.

"That sounds like it could work," Flaxen smiled as well.

"Seriously?" Sasuke was unimpressed.

"I'll bite, where are you going to get an exorcist?" Keiji however was very interested.

"I think I know just the person," I smiled, "Let's add Kyoto to our itinerary, and pick her up later."

"Yes." And so "Kyoto" had been added to our quest log. This meeting was turning out to be much more productive than I pictured it would be.

"So if you say Kyoto is for later," Ranmaru remarked, "What do you plan to do now?"

Flaxen and I looked over our quest log. I spied something that I had hastily scribbled on at some point, which made it very hard to read. I squinted to get a better look and read out loud,

"Saika."

Oh yeah, the Saika: The mercenary group that Nobunaga tried to exterminate in one of the most brutal stages of the second game. The stage that became the real catalyst for his death at Honnouji in that story.

I suppose if we were going to save one, we may as well save them all.

"Yeah let's go to the Saika village," I said.

"Why?" Nobunaga frowned.

"To save it. We may as well clean up your image a little, convince people your not an omnicidal Demon King and all," I said, "And prevent a certain mercenary from showing up at a certain temple and finishing the job a certain someone can't do." Nobunaga understood immediately.

"So Mitsuhide can't even stick to his resolve. How disappointing." Nobunaga stood up, his wife and page following his lead, "Come."

"Hey we haven't all agreed to that plan!" Masamune shouted after him.

"I can't say I'm opposed to saving people though," Keiji admitted, "I'm in."

"Me too," Hanbei said cheerfully jumping up as well, "I can't say I like following Nobunaga's orders, but it's for a good cause this time."

"I have no objections," Sasuke shrugged. Only the Date remained.

"Tch, I'd much rather get started with the hunt for Matsunaga," Masamune grumbled, "Isn't that supposed to be our goal here?"

"There's nothing wrong with taking a few detours on the way though," Flaxen told him, "Besides, the Saika are a good ally in case you ever want to try taking over the land."

"I don't need any allies, just my boys," Masamune retorted, "But whatever. Since it's not like we have any other options right now."

With Masamune in agreement, Kojuro and the men followed suit without argument. We all met up in the bandwagon, and tried to get comfortable in the cramped space. It was then that I remembered our earlier failure and locked eyes with a somewhat nervous Ranmaru and a nonchalant Hanbei (I did not want to lock eyes with Nobunaga!).

"Don't worry, it'll work this time," Hanbei whispered to me, confidently. That did make me relax somewhat. If the resident genius strategist understood how our time-machine worked, that was definitely a good sign.

My fears were put at rest when we took of and the increasingly familiar feeling of racing through the time stream overtook me. Our destination was the Saika Village, and we were good to go…

We did not end up at the Saika Village…


	5. Chapter 5

**New chapter time! As you know last time we were just heading to the Saika village...and didn't get there! **

**Neither I or Fortune Maiden own Basara, Warriors, or any other form of media referenced here.  
****This chapter was brought to you by me, Flaxen!**

* * *

"Come on Yumekichi, let it out." Our little mascot obliged wonderfully, his lunch reappearing in a torrent of retching.

Who would've thought that stopping for a lunch break and then heading off at 88 miles per hour (not to mention bending space and time) was not a good idea when you have travel sick passengers? Not us, which was kind of evident in the small piles of vomit gathering either side of the wagon.

"Hopefully this will teach you to share the sweets." I joked, dodging the glare Ranmaru sent at me before leaning his head back over.

Meanwhile, Kojuro, Masamune and Fortune were debating our destination, partly because we really weren't sure of our current position, and partly because the satnav had fallen into the back, where it was being ruthlessly hunted down by Sasuke and me. "Found it!"

Rescuing it from under Noh's heel, Sasuke passed it up to Kojuro, who scanned it with a stern glance. "World: Warriors, Kyoto."

"At least we're halfway there." Fortune murmured, neatly side stepping another pile of lunch. "We can just drive from here right?"

"Actually that may be a problem." Kojuro interrupted. He and Masamune had climbed down from the box, and were examining our horses.

"These guys shouldn't be so tired, they had at least an hour's rest when we were eating lunch."

Jumping off the back of the wagon, I moved to stand next to Fortune, who seemed to be glaring slightly at Hanbei. Now that should've sent up an alarm, but I was too busy admiring the view. When I put this idea to Fortune, it'd had originally been over rage of the Matsunaga variety. What I might actually see never really came into it.

"While we're here, we might as well pick up Okuni." Hanbei mentioned lazily, patting Ranmaru on the back. Just as it seemed the poor kid had finally recovered, off he went again. "We can always stable the horses too."

"No offence Shorty," Masamune smirked, leaning up against the side of the wagon, "But we're not exactly a lone traveller. The horses will get treated nice, but we may attract a few stares."

* * *

In the end, only a small group went into the city proper. Fortune promised to bring something back when she saw me sulking at being left behind, but Nobunaga had wanted to get in and out as soon as possible so I wasn't holding out much hope.

Seeing as the Date clan were playing a card game, and my books were packed under the food bags, I decided to approach Noh, who was petting one of the horses with more care than I would've expected considering the woman keeps claws up her sleeves. Despite Masamune's grumblings on the subject, the handlebars and exhaust pipes were removed from the horses and dumped in the back, another reason why reading was out of the question. "Can I help you?"

"I just wondered if you wanted to talk, seeing as we could be waiting for a while." Noh fixed me with a pointed look, before carrying on with her stroking.

"I doubt they'll keep us waiting longer than an hour. If I know my husband, he'll want to head straight for the medicine shop to deal with our little sickness problem."

"And then?"

"Who knows?"

Sensing that the conversation was over, I moved away, again feeling bored. Who knew that even surrounded by her heroes, a girl could wish for something fun to happen? Unfortunately, that led me to fall into the grips of a habit that all my teachers at school had been nagging me about: Thinking about everything but what was relevant.

We'd rescued Oichi and Nagamasa, which was cause for celebration (if eating enough sweets to make two of us sick wasn't celebration, I'd like to see what is) but that just meant we could really do anything in our quest log. Even kill Matsunaga Hisahide, the most slippery snake the Sengoku Period had to offer.

Come to think about it, snakes aren't slippery, they have a very tight grip on things. So where did the expression come from? Maybe Hanbei would know…except he isn't here right now. Because we're stuck until the horses are rested and the others decided to traipse around town.

The second we get back I'm getting my doctor to test me for ADHD.

* * *

Dozing off in a camp with time travellers and assorted samurai may seem like a good idea, but for those of you who value the unbruised quality of your skin, I don't recommend it. Because when I decided to take a nap, all dreams of a nice, tropical paradise vanished, and it was all thanks to one Takenaka Hanbei and his new stick. "Ah you're awake!"

Moving his stick away from my head, our resident (self proclaimed) time travel expert sauntered back to the bandwagon, unaware of the painful revenge I was plotting. Sensing my gaze on his back, Hanbei turned slightly, that cocky grin plastered on, "Unless you don't want your present?"

Eh, revenge could wait.

Clambering back to my feet, I followed him back to our assembling group, noticing the healthier skin colour of Yumekichi and Ranmaru. Well that was the first major obstacle we'd overcome, but I had doubts it would be the last. Spotting me, Keiji rootled in the sack he'd placed in the back, withdrawing a light parcel. "Try this on for size." Over his head, Fortune gave me the thumbs up, untying the strings on her own package.

Tearing a little whole in the material, I poked my finger in, feeling silky material. Suddenly excited, I finished untying the damn thing, and held the garment in front of me. "Oh wow." It was a yukata made of purple silk, with white feathers fluttering to the hem in a pile. The fact that I had no idea how it was paid for seemed extremely unimportant, and I rushed around the side of the wagon, waving it at Fortune who couldn't help laughing.

"I figured you might like it. What do you think of mine?" So wrapped up in my excitement, I hadn't noticed her own package, which turned out to be another yukata, only hers was green with a leafy pattern.

"It's gorgeous! But we have nowhere to wear them." This time it was Hanbei who smirked,

"Yeah right, like you've forgotten. The kabuki show starts later tonight, which leaves you pair enough time to get ready." Then a thought seemed to hit him. "Or maybe I should go see if there's a later showing so Lady Noh can also get ready."

The speed at which he flew away at was truly a marvel to watch. The speed Noh chased him at was even more impressive considering her footwear.

* * *

In the dim evening light, our party of intrepid time travellers moved through the city with slightly more ease than you'd expect. I say slightly because well, the Basara group were fascinated by this familiar yet alien environment, and even though the low lighting hid our Western-ess fairly well, Fortune and I didn't move with the same lazy ease as the Odas or Hanbei.

Of course it had nothing to do with the fact that the group had to stop walking three times in a row, waiting whilst one of them dragged me away from what had caught my eye, pushing me ahead until the cycle began again.

But I couldn't help it! Modern day America was too familiar and our recruitments were done in a little bit of a hurry. This could be my one chance to immerse myself fully in the time period. My possible ADHD aside, there was so much to look at, so much to hear and smell.

Those feelings nearly extended to taste, but Kojuro yanked on my wrist again, puling me away from the noodle stall that was just begging for my patronage. Having gone through practically the same routine earlier, Fortune could only grin at my excitement.

By the time we actually got to the play, the introduction music had started, and the debate over whether or not I should be tethered to one of our more responsible party members was just ending (in my favour I'm glad to say).

Unfortunately the numerous delays -that were in no way my fault- had left us at the back of the crowd, situated to where you could just see the stage, but you would have to strain your ears pretty hard. Irritated by this, Sasuke did what ninjas do and snuck closer to the front, under the disguise of keeping an eye out for Okuni. It's just as well he did, because upon his return during the interval, he was eager to laugh over the actresses' dialogue, while we'd been stuck with Ranmaru and Hanbei, who tried valiantly but ultimately failing at lip reading.

Not that I was giving the stage my complete focus. I wanted to be the first to spot Okuni, going on my three factors of pink parasol, graceful movements and a high pitched voice. About ten minutes in, I gave up due to the fact that there were no parasols in sight, we were deaf to the goings on of the play, and even graceful movements were out due to the elegance in which the actresses performed.

During the second interval, while Sasuke filled us in again, I felt someone's eyes on me. That uncomfortable sensation when you know someone's watching, but you don't know who, and you don't know why.

"Something wrong?" Fortune whispered, following my eyes to the stage. It was clear for now, set changes going on with the sun goddess's pond being exchanged for a dowdy cave.

"It's probably nothing." I reassured, noticing by now the others were taking notice of our chat.

"More plans?" Nobunaga smirked.

"Don't worry, we have no shortage of them! I'm just questioning her choice of _Mario _references."

The play started up again, the creepy feeling leaving as Amaterasu shut herself up in the cavern.

* * *

To put it simple and sweetly, kabuki cast the same spell as the theatre back home did. Even in the cheap seats, we could see how Okuni's troupe of actresses was unique in their skill, and certainly not the shameful women they would later be portrayed as.

The hypnosis was broken by the applause in front of me, and even then a second passed before I joined in, sad to know that it had ended. As the crowds dispersed, women emerged from behind the stage, looking completely different now that their artistic makeup had been removed, and rattled their collecting buckets. Keiji immediately moved to put some of his own money in, and within seconds had complimented the whole display, bring a smile to the girl's face. But Fortune and I were too distracted with our own problem.

"I knew it wouldn't be the last obstacle!" I groaned, leaning heavily on one of the Date men as pins and needles ruthlessly attacked my numb feet. Time for an old family trick… "Can one of you step on my foot?"

"Gladly." Masamune smirked, pressing firmly downwards. The increased pressure reminded my nerves there was a foot there, and within seconds, the feeling began to return. Along with a different kind of feeling. Whoever was watching me before had started up again, the sensation getting closer and closer with every heartbeat.

"I knew it!" Our whole party turned on the spot, meeting Okuni's smile with looks of outright shock. Behind her, Keiji had returned from charming the girls, and was simply staring. "I knew I felt the presence of a Mystic!"

"Close but not quite." Hanbei explained, deadpan serious for once. The effect dulled any smiles, and even Masamune moved his foot. "None of us are Mystics, but I think Flaxen has some ties to them."

First I've heard! "Nice joke Hanbei, if I have ties to the Mystic Realm, why do I have to get up at four to do homework?" Next to me, Fortune was covering her mouth in understanding, her expression mirrored by Ranmaru.

"So that's why…"

Whatever the end of that sentence might have been, it was quickly confirmed by Hanbei. "It might be a very dilute link, but that's not the point. What I'm trying to say is…you're sort of powering the bandwagon."

So sue me, my reaction was a little lacklustre. "Oh, okay." But what was I supposed to do, jump up and down like a crazy girl? Even if I'd wanted to, my pins and needles were still pricking holes in my skin. My tiredness my also have had something to do with that. "So you're saying that I have powers connected to the time stream, and I still have that homework problem?"

"Yes, it's called procrastination."

I…had no snarky response to that. There was nothing more awkward than the king of sleep calling you lazy. Of course then I actually remembered Okuni and the whole exorcising-the-Demon-King plan, so I gently nudged Fortune. "You know, it's such a boy's club on the wagon."

She tilted her head a little, but caught my drift, a large smirk spreading across her face. "Oh yeah, no chance for makeup or a good gossip."

"If only we had someone to help alleviate the boredom."

"Not to mention Lady Flaxen's unknown abilities." Kojuro reminded. "You appear to be somewhat knowledgeable in the subject."

The second she saw him, Okuni was sold on the idea.

* * *

"Maybe it's the hair?"

"Nah, women love deep voices."

"I'm putting my money on the scar."

Apparently Okuni zeroing in on Kojuro alone was enough to begin a deep discussion about what women looked for in a man. Dodging around the Date men, I caught up with Fortune, who had been discussing things with Hanbei. Spotting me coming, the strategist moved to the side a little bit, letting me between them.

"So it was you all along huh?" He smirked, ruffling my hair a little bit. "I figured it had to be one of you pair."

"Guess so, but we could've saved the horses a trip if you hadn't pestered her with all your questions!" I looked up at Fortune's words.

"Saved the horses a trip?"

"Long story, not one I want to remember right now, like Hanbei and Mt Inaba."

Even though we'd carried on walking, Hanbei had stopped dead in his tracks, a look of horror slowly spreading across his face. "Uh, how much do you know?"

"Just that you captured the castle with only a few men." Fortune hastily placated. I on the other hand was still feeling the rude awakening he'd given me earlier.

"Well, that and your sister lost one of her kimonos that day."

Contrary to my expectations, Hanbei looked relieved, if a little embarrassed. "Phew, for a second there, I thought you were talking about…well I won't go into that incident."

Great, there goes my curiosity!

"I didn't know you guys knew Oyu. Did she achieve something great after my death?" Suddenly feeling really uncomfortable with the subject, after all, not many would refer to their own death so breezily; I looked to Fortune for guidance. She came through brilliantly.

"Well, a book was written about Lord Hideyoshi, and both of you played a large role. Flaxen, did you bring your copy?"

Since Hanbei was looking straight at me, I couldn't subtly remind Fortune of the uh, relationship between Hideyoshi and Oyu. Luckily, I hadn't thought to pack one of my most reliable sources of Japanese history. The entire contents of the sweet jar? Yes. _Taiko? _No. "Sorry, can't say I did."

Shrugging, Hanbei returned to walking, and even though we were a little behind, we were still back in time to hear Kojuro tell the Date men to knock it off.

"Since Okuni will be joining us in the morning, it's probably best we set up camp for the night." Sasuke advised, leaning against the bandwagon. "We've done a lot today."

"For better or worse." Masamune grumbled, not so slyly looking at Nobunaga. With any luck, our Demon King would prove to be a valuable teammate, and he and the rest of th- oh who am I kidding? Short of a miracle, there's going to be suspicion on that front.

Even so, he and Nohime volunteered to look for firewood, whilst Fortune and I rolled out the blankets that I'd stowed away prior to starting the trip, and Ranmaru collected the cushions. While the fire was set up, and the men were discussing a watch schedule, I claimed an area close to the conversation, curling up as I did so.

Before I realised it, I was fast asleep, and dreaming of my crossbow bolt making it a little closer to Akechi…


	6. Chapter 6

**Welcome back to our adventure of epic proportions, one that cannot be fettered, even by time and space! Neither I nor Fortune Maiden own Sengoku Basara or Samurai Warriors. **

**This chapter was hand crafted elegantly by Fortune Maiden. **

**Ch 6: MANSTRAVAGANT Training**

* * *

On the following morning, several things were supposed to happen. First we would have a nice breakfast in Kyoto, then Okuni would rejoin us, and then we would all head out to the battleground that was the Saika Village and try to save it.

Aside from Okuni's reappearance, none of that happened.

The first thing I became aware of that morning was Kojuro's loud bark waking everyone up. It was still dark out, so I was barely aware of my surroundings, other than someone stirring beside me.

It took me a while to remember where I was, but when I did, I shot up taking in everyone's amused expressions. Flaxen and I were the last ones to awake, if Kojuro's glare was any indication. Looking around, the others were all wearing expressions ranging from annoyed to amused. Only Hanbei and Yumekichi still looked to be half asleep.

"What time is it?" I groaned.

"It's well into the Hour of the Rat," Kojuro answered, "At Lord Masamune's request, I allowed you to sleep in enough."

"The what hour?" Instinctively, I felt for the phone in my pocket, but Flaxen reached hers first.

"It's not even 6am," she frowned waving it in front Kojuro, "Why are you waking us up so early?"

"You mean it's _already_ 6," Masamune approached and yanked our blankets, "Rise and shine ladies, we've got a long epic day ahead of us."

"We've already prepared for the trip," Ranmaru explained in a too-perky voice that in my half-asleep state just made me want to snap at him, "As soon as Lady Okuni joins us, we will depart."

There wasn't much time to ask any further questions as Keiji was quickly ushering us to get ready and the others were walking off in whichever direction to give us our privacy. I suddenly wished we had invited more girls from the get-go. It would have been nice to have someone help two time-strangers out, but neither Flaxen nor I were willing to ask Noh for help. Oh well, at least we'd have Okuni join us soon. She seemed a lot more agreeable.

* * *

Okuni was late.

By now Flaxen and I were wide awake, washed up and dressed (in our regular clothes for the time being), breakfast was being served by a dutiful Ranmaru who had remembered to buy necessary supplies like food on our first excursion to the town, and the sun had finally shown itself.

"Could she have forgotten?" Sasuke grumbled, "Say the word and I'll go after her."

"No," Noh said calmly, "Someone like Okuni would never forget an encounter like this." She glanced at Kojuro with a sly smile that made him look away.

"Lady Okuni runs a theater troupe so she probably needs to tie up some loose ends before leaving," Hanbei explained, "By the way you two," he turned to us, "You're not fooling anyone. Stop picking at your rice and eat it."

Flaxen and I froze exchanging sheepish looks. Now everyone's attention had turned to us.

"Is it not to your liking?" Ranmaru asked concerned, "Too dry? Not dry enough?"

"N-no, it's not that," I stammered. It's true that I was a picky eater, but rice happened to be one of the few things I really liked… with soy sauce. Without it, it just felt really bland and tasteless, so I could only force myself to eat it very slowly. Flaxen on the other hand, wasn't eating at all.

"Sorry, I don't really like rice," she admitted with a sigh.

"I see," Ranmaru sighed, "My apologies then. Is there something you would prefer instead?"

"Er um…," while Flaxen discussed that with Ranmaru, I caught Kojuro's disapproving look.

That was strike two.

* * *

Breakfast was an awkward affair, but in the end, Flaxen and I satiated our appetites with the snacks we'd brought and the promise to pop on over to the future some time later and stock up on things we'd actually want to eat. This idea was particularly liked by Nobunaga, Masamune and Keiji who looked forward to seeing what kind of things were available in the future.

Okuni still had yet to rejoin us though, and going into town seemed to be our only option at that point.

Which we would have done.

Had strike three not occurred.

It happened when we were trying to find a way to make everyone and everything fit on our bandwagon. Like all group efforts, it involved arguing, sabotaging, lazing about, and good old fashioned small talk. The small talkers of the hour were Flaxen, me, and Keiji and while we mostly chatted about general things like food, hobbies and the weather, _somehow_ the conversation had turned to our weapons.

"I've always wanted to try out a crossbow," Keiji admitted, "Archery is standard enough, but your crossbow seems a lot more convenient."

"I tried archery once," I said, "The bow was too heavy for me. I couldn't shoot straight at all. What do you think, Flax?"

Flaxen looked at her weapon, carefully weighing it. "I can't say I really know how to use this too well, myself."

"Seriously?" Keiji was dumbfounded, "So why are you carrying that thing around?"

"Well I needed to use something, and this was the only thing I had at home."

"Same," I admitted, "My uncle has this katana perched on a wall in his basement, and well, it's a lot better than something like a kitchen knife, right?"

"So you don't know how to use it either? What kind of twisted future do you come from?" Keiji ran a hand through his hair and sighed, "Oh well, rescuing lovely maidens from danger is all in a day's work for me. Stay close to me when we get into battles alright? I'll protect—

Now this would have ended with a declaration of protection from a dashing gentleman and we would have been on our way. But Keiji never got to finish his sentence for he trailed off as a very fiery aura suddenly started burning behind us. _Of course_, we'd had to discuss our lack of combat experience just as Kojuro was walking behind us.

To put it nicely, he was not amused.

* * *

"And as such, I propose we take this time to teach these two at least some basic combat skills so they don't get themselves killed when we _travel to a battlefield_." Flaxen and I recoiled at the intensity of his words. When he put it like that, taking our little entourage to face off against the Oda Army was a terrible idea. I'm surprised it hadn't been an issue when we rode through Nagashino.

Kojuro's declaration was met with unanimous approval. It probably had to do with the fact that his tone left zero room for argument. Or that the only one who would oppose him (Nobunaga) was too amused by this turn of events to do so.

"So then, how shall it go?" Nobunaga asked instead.

"They can't become experts in a day," Hanbei commented, "That's impossible no matter how you train them. The most you can expect is general competency."

"Unless…" Sasuke began but immediately trailed off, "No, that's a bit cruel."

"C-cruel?" Flaxen squeaked.

"What is it?" Nobunaga demanded. Masamune seemed to understand though, and started laughing.

"Yes! I knew I liked you Sarutobi," he walked over to the head of our impromptu meeting circle and whispered something into Kojuro's ear. To our horror, the large intimidating retainer paled and immediately tried to talk his Lord out of whatever he was about to promote.

"Alright Sarutobi, get up here," Masamune yelled at him, "No one knows Takeda-style training better than you."

At those words, Flaxen and I both understood what was coming.

"Hold on you can't—

"We're not made of iron, you know. That kind of thing could seriously kill us!"

"Woah now I'm curious," Keiji smiled, "Would Takeda-style training have anything to do with that ripping sound we heard back then?"

"Not exactly," Sasuke sighed, "And unless you're willing to take a trip to Kai, which we've already ruled out for sanity reasons, we won't be doing the actual thing." Flaxen and I let out relieved sighs. Around us, there was disappointment.

"But if you let me borrow your men for a few hours, I can make a general mock-up." Masamune agreed immediately and at once our dread returned, to everyone else's grand excitement.

"Question, what exactly are we talking about?" Hanbei asked.

Masamune's smirk grew.

"The **Manstravaganza**."

* * *

The **Manstravaganza** (known for being so manly and epic that it could only be properly expressed in bold font) was not for the faint of heart. Flaxen and I were very much the faint of heart.

Fortunately, it wouldn't be a **Manstravaganza** as Takeda Shingen would do it, so we did have some hope of survival and Sasuke (at the very least) promised that there would be nothing life-threatening. Somehow that wasn't reassuring though.

Aside from the Date Men, Sasuke had also recruited Ranmaru and Hanbei to help him out, the former's involvement being the result of Nobunaga's unsubtle desire to learn the Takeda's training secrets and the latter's being simple curiosity. While they were setting up the event, Flaxen and I were to be schooled in the basics of our weapons so that we could at least achieve "general competency" before we were thrown to the sharks.

Seeing as we had different weapons entirely, Kojuro decided that we were best trained separately so that not a moment would be wasted. Personally, I'm not sure which of us got the better deal as far as teachers went.

Flaxen was to be trained by Mr. and Mrs. Oda (and Keiji), while I was to be in the very capable hands of Masamune and Kojuro.

Seriously, I can't decide which was worse!

"Back straight," Kojuro snapped, "Relax your shoulders more, bend your knee—that's too much. Your hands are too close together. Don't lean—

"Please stop," I whined. I wasn't sure how long we'd been at it, but already all of my muscles were crying and all that passed was Kojuro telling me how to hold my sword, "I can't keep up with all of this."

"Hey Kojuro, it'd be better if you give her a demonstration," Masamune remarked sitting comfortably against the tree.

"Yes, my Lord," Kojuro drew his sword and stood next to me so that I could observe his posture. "Seeing as you are left-handed, just copy my pose exactly." I nodded and held my katana out, trying to imitate him. His look of disapproval told me I was still doing something wrong, causing me to shrink back.

Masamune, tired of watching my pathetic display walked over and started physically moving my arms into the proper position. His touch was forceful and impatient (not at all like Hollywood liked to do these things), but at this point I just let him do what he needed. Finally he nodded and backed up with a grin.

"Good," he told me, "Remember that pose, 'cause I'm not doing that again."

"Moving on then," Kojuro sighed, "Watch closely. I'll demonstrate some very basic cuts." He held his sword over his head and slowly swung it downward. "The key here is to just let the blade drop. Don't put too much force behind the swing. Just guide the blade." Then he made a slow horizontal cut, followed by a diagonal cut. "That holds for these techniques too. Let your left hand guide your sword, and make sure to follow through to the end."

The words "follow through" made me think of my old tennis lessons. I wasn't what you would call "athletic" but I did like tennis and was fairly good at it, as far as swinging the racket and hitting the ball went (my weakness lied elsewhere). Without really thinking about it, I tried to imitate a slow tennis swing but midway up, Kojuro grabbed my wrist, and gave me a long unimpressed look.

"S-sorry, I was thinking of something," I stammered and proceeded to get back into the proper stance.

"This isn't a toy," Kojuro reminded me, "If this is your first time holding a sword, you shouldn't be using a real one to begin with. But seeing as this is all we have, don't experiment like some clueless idiot. Start with the downward swing, and keep going until I tell you to stop."

With no other choice, I started practicing the movement. The sword was a lot heavier than I anticipated which made my swings feel stiff and awkward, not at all like Kojuro's natural gliding motion, but then again, the difference in our experience was beyond painfully obvious. To their credit though, Kojuro and Masamune were very patient teachers with Kojuro calmly (and constantly) pointing out my mistakes, and Masamune occasionally saying something that could be considered encouraging.

By the time Kojuro finally told me to stop, I felt like I was at least comfortable with the motion even if it still wasn't feeling right. The reason I stopped wasn't because I had finally done something right, but rather I was so tired that my grip on the sword was starting to falter.

"Stamina, zero," Masamune remarked unhelpfully as I caught my breath in the shade, "No offense, but that was kinda pathetic."

"None taken," I panted, accepting the water bottle he handed me, "I've never had much stamina."

"I can tell. How old are you anyway?"

"Nineteen, why?"

Masamune gave me a long critical look before smirking. "And you've never even held a weapon before? At nineteen, I'm already fighting with _six_ blades."

"You started young," I muttered.

Masamune didn't seem to hear that, taking my sword and looking it over instead. "Not really much point in using this thing," he told me, "It's just an ornamental display piece."

"Hm?"

"A sword like this would get destroyed easily in a duel, even a non-lethal one. You should tell your uncle that before he gets hurt."

"Thanks but it is just a decorative piece," I admitted, "It's not meant to be used."

"Yet it's better than a kitchen knife?" Oh so he'd overheard my comment to Keiji as well. I shrugged.

"It looks cooler."

"Course it does," Masamune shrugged and sheathed the sword before handing it back to me, "Next chance we get, drop me off in Oshu for a spell. One of my old wooden swords should be a good fit for you. It's much lighter, less dangerous… and a lot sturdier than some prop."

"Is that really alright? Thanks," I smiled. My smile lasted only a moment as Masamune jumped to his feet and waved Kojuro over with his hand.

"But seeing as we don't have a wooden sword right now, we'll work with what we have," he grinned, "Alright Kojuro, break's over. Get her started on the horizontal cut. I'm going to go check on our Man-Party."

I really hoped I'd even last long enough to see it.

* * *

Somehow I made it through the training session in one piece. I could barely move and jut lay on the ground ignoring Masamune's occasional prods as the three of us waited for Flaxen's group to rejoin us.

Flaxen lay down beside me as soon as she saw me, a similar worn out look on her face.

"How'd it go?" I asked.

"Still alive."

"Any progress?"

"I'm happy to report that everyone in this party _but me_ can hit the bull's-eye," she retorted, "You?"

"I can hold the sword correctly," In the end that was really the only thing we accomplished. Despite what he'd said, Masamune did need to mold me several more times, which only irritated him enough to suspend everything else until I got that down. That... took a while.

"We're doomed."

"What are our chances of escape?" I whispered.

"In this shape? None." Glancing around at our mentors, it was clear that none of them had broken a sweat during our entire workout. Of course, why would they? Their job was to shout orders in the shade while Flazen and I did all the running, swinging, jumping…

This was not a sign of good things to come.

"Hey, what are you two mumbling about down there?" Keiji asked.

"I hope you're not planning something silly like an escape," Masamune teased, "Sarutobi's going to a lot of trouble setting up the Man-Party just for you." At this we just groaned.

Thankfully, we were left alone after that, at least until Sasuke's group returned to announce that everything was ready. And to the surprise of everyone (namely because we all forgot) Okuni suddenly appeared, twirling her parasol over her shoulder and carrying a picnic basket on her arm.

"Good morning," she said cheerfully.

"It's the afternoon," Kojuro grumbled.

"Good afternoon then."

"'Bout time you showed up," Masamune grumbled, "Where were you?"

"Ah well this and that," Okuni laughed, "I can't leave my troupe without at least some instruction."

"What's with the picnic basket?"

"I brought us some snacks for the road," she slid the basket off her arm and opened it revealing several rows of sweets like dango and mochi neatly wrapped up. Several faces lit up at seeing it.

"Don't eat those on the bandwagon," Flaxen snapped finally sitting up.

"Please," I added.

"Well, we're not leaving yet," Masamune quickly helped himself to a stick of dango, "Lady Okuni, have we got a show for you."

Okuni's smile only widened.

* * *

And so while the rest of our group happily enjoyed the snacks Okuni had brought, Flaxen and I prepared to tackle the **Manstravaganza**.

"Somehow I always pictured it would be _us_ eating dango while watching this," Flaxen muttered.

"Me too."

"Alright then, are you two paying attention? Listen up," Sasuke sighed and looked down at the script he'd been given. I wondered where it came from.

"Welcome to the first, and hopefully only, Time-Travelling **Manstravaganza**," Sasuke read without much energy, "This event is blah, blah, blah, skim, skim, skim, alright here we go. We've set up three challenges that will test your strength, skill and stamina, and also your ability to react to unexpected situations." He flipped the script to the last page rolling his eyes. "Since it is in our better interests to keep you alive, this event is not life-threatening. However, as anything can be lethal in the right circumstances, you can rest assured that Katakura and myself will be nearby to protect against anything that can maim and-or kill you."

Flaxen and I froze.

"_Is_ there anything that can maim and-or kill us?"

"Probably."

"Probably" turned out to be "everything" as Flaxen and I quickly discovered when the first event began. The first challenge was for us to run across a field as rocks rained down on us, courtesy of a special move Hanbei had been practicing. Only, they weren't actually rocks (as that qualified as lethal), but rather small bushels of hay. Still not very pleasant to get hit with though, but luckily anything that was about to land directly on our heads was knocked away by an invisible force (that we later learned was Sasuke's doubles throwing kunai at the bushels before they hit us).

They were hard to avoid though, and though the invisible force constantly saved our heads from taking a hit, it wouldn't act if the bushel was landing anywhere else. Plenty of times we wound up tripping due to something landing right in our path and our backs and legs paid the price for it. Even with my near-sightedness, I could've sworn I saw Hanbei smirking from his position above the raining hay. Although on the plus side, we did learn that our weapons weren't too bad as shields.

The second event was similar but this time rather than running through and avoiding getting hit, the bushels were being shot directly at us from two cannons that vaguely resembled ball machines.

"Where did they even get all this stuff?" I cried crouching on the ground.

"I asked Hanbei earlier," Flaxen answered, "He said they sent Ranmaru into the town with a horse and—

"Gotcha." I sighed and continued crouching under the flying hay stacks.

"Aren't we supposed to fight our way through them?" Despite saying that, Flaxen made no indication to get up, and continued crouching beside me. She flinched briefly as the invisible force knocked away another bushel that was about to hit her head.

"I think this is a lot safer," I winced as one rolled off my back, "But my back is going to feel this later."

"Your hair too," Flaxen noted, "Mine must be completely covered in hay by now."

"It is… we should probably stay away from the horses for a while."

"Yeah…"

It was only through our whispering encouragement and invisible force's help that we ever crawled our way to the end of the course. Evidently we took more than a while though because at the top of the small hill we crawled to, Kojuro and Sasuke were drinking tea—and clearly had been for a long while.

"Oh you made it," Sasuke stood up stretching, "'Bout time."

"I'm very glad to see you here," Kojuro didn't miss a moment drawing his weapon. Sasuke took out his giant shuriken as well.

"The last challenge is a fight against us," Sasuke explained, "I guess it's kinda like that time Date and Master Sanada did this, only no masks."

"No challenge either," Kojuro pointed out gesturing to our trembling figures.

How could we be expected to fight them? Before yesterday, we'd never even held weapons before. And Kojuro himself spent hours teaching me to _hold_ a sword, he would have known better than anyone that we couldn't do this.

"Well go on," he told us, "Draw your weapons."

"B-but, what if we hit you?" Flaxen clutched her crossbow close.

"That won't happen," Sasuke assured us, "Come on, let's do this." They waited patiently for us to act, even though we stood still as statues for what felt like a long time.

Finally I drew my sword, taking the very position I'd spent hours perfecting.

"Fortune?"

"Not life-threatening, right?" My voice was shaking, "Even if you rough us up a little, you won't actually kill us right?"

"Of course not," Kojuro agreed.

"W-well then, let's do this." I gave Flaxen a shaky smile which she returned and loaded her crossbow.

For the first time that day, Kojuro smiled.

Now in that moment, I suddenly recalled all those "secret tests of characters" mentors liked to put heroes through. Kojuro and Sasuke knew better than anyone how completely helpless we were, so maybe the whole point of this was just to test our resolve—see if we're willing to fight despite the odds. I figured that they would back off and declare that we've cleared the **Manstravaganza** and proven ourselves.

Instead they lunged.

And then, I saw stars.

* * *

"Are they dead?"

"Of course not. They're perfectly alright."

"I think you hit them too hard."

"What are you saying? He barely touched them!"

"So why did they pass out?"

"Survey says, fear."

I think I heard chuckles after that last one. Slowly I opened my eyes letting the world come back into focus. My sword was lying beside me, sheathed and Flaxen was a few feet away, also stirring. The others noticed us right away and gathered round.

"Well now. Welcome back to the land of the living," that was Masamune's smug voice. As I turned my head, his equally smug grin came into view. I closed my eyes again, hoping it would go away.

"Hey, don't go to sleep again," at least Keiji sounded concerned, "Come on, you're alright, I promise."

I couldn't say I felt any pain, other than sore muscles from all the exercising, so cautiously I sat up. Keiji extended a hand to me so that I could stand. Ranmaru picked up my sword and quietly handed it to me. They extended their chivalry to Flaxen after that. She looked around.

"Is it finally over?"

"Yes," Noh answered, "Don't worry, you performed very admirably."

"Really?"

Noh shrugged. "Well you were very entertaining to watch at any rate."

"Admittedly, you did a lot worse than even we predicted," Hanbei admitted, "Though you do deserve points for not giving up."

"I didn't think that was an option," I muttered, "So what now? Are we fish food if we ever set foot on a battlefield." I don't even want to think about what would have happened if we'd gone to Saika Village today.

"Don't worry," Masamune suddenly spoke up, his earlier smugness replaced with a calmer tone, "The Man-Party was more to gauge your potential than anything else. Seeing as you and Blondie are the ones running the show around here, your lives are _unfortunately_ a bit of a priority for us. Until we find Matsunaga Hisahide and give him his just desserts, we'll watch out for you." He wasn't afraid to look us directly in the eye when he said it, so we knew he meant every word.

Then Kojuro added. "_However_, your training will continue. You must learn how to defend yourselves."

"Although we won't be doing this again. This Man-Thing is useless for you two," Hanbei shrugged, "Maybe it only works for…well, _men_."

"Or probably just Lord Shingen and Yukimura," Flaxen muttered under her breath so only I'd hear. It was hard to object.

"Now then," Okuni suddenly took our hair into her hands and started picking out the hay, "Let's say we get you two cleaned up. I anticipated something like this and made some necessary arrangements."

* * *

Okuni was officially the Bandwagon Favorite. Her "arrangements" was to reserve a bath house for us so that we could all relax after a long day. The heated pool melted away all the fatigue the training brought.

"This is the greatest," Flaxen sighed happily.

"I could do this everyday," I agreed.

Okuni, Noh, Flaxen and I were the only ones in the pool and we passed the time chatting about the culture. Okuni was happy to answer our questions provided we answered hers, which she had a lot of. Noh wasn't as talkative, carefully looking around instead.

"Is something wrong, Lady Noh?" Flaxen asked. Noh's eyes narrowed.

"Not qui—yes!" Her eyes locked onto a group of shrubs and she suddenly tossed the dagger she'd placed beside her. To our alarm, a cry sounded and after some rustling, Hanbei and Ranmaru suddenly tumbled out.

"Eek!" I instinctively dived under water.

"I knew it," Noh scowled, "What are you doing here."

"M-my Lady, I can explain!" A red-faced Ranmaru stammered, burying his face in his hands.

"The guys' pool is too cramped," Hanbei explained calmly (eyes tightly shut at least), "We were looking for an empty one to relax in but got lost."

"A likely story." Before Noh could act though, Flaxen grabbed her towel, carefully wrapped it around herself, jumped out of the water and…

The sound of the slaps that resounded through the bathhouse was truly impressive.


	7. Chapter 7

** Geez, can't relax for a second can we? Alright, usual witty disclaimer time (I hope it's witty anyway): We, the Maiden of Fortune and the Samurai of Flaxen Hair do not own any media referenced here. **

* * *

Despite the unscheduled interruption of Hanbei and Ranmaru, the rest of the bathhouse trip went smoothly, the pain from our training leaving our muscles not exactly instantly, but pretty darn close to it.

That is to say, me and Fortune weren't completely out of the woods. I don't know about Fortune, but my beauty regime pretty much boiled down to 'brush hair and hope for the best.' Okuni and Noh's beauty regime on the other hand… "This is so boring!" I whined, leaning over the side of the wagon.

After one too many complaints that they were worse than my sister and did they really need to look perfect when chances were we'd be camping again, Noh had pretty much ordered me outside, and Fortune had followed, whether to escape the makeup or make sure I didn't eat all the snacks, I didn't know.

Either way, we were out here, practically starting a bet on who would be out first, the boys or the girls. Considering the fact that there were more boys and their armour looked a whole lot more complicated than even Noh's ensemble, I was seriously considering putting a fiver on Okuni and Noh.

Luckily for my wallet, before I could pose this idea, Masamune appeared in the doorway to the baths, saw us and smirked, "Hey Shorty, Kid, better stay in there, there's a fearsome warrior out here who seems annoyed!"

"I don't care if that's a jab at our military skill, you called me a fearsome warrior." I grinned, moving over so the men could pile in. Predictably, Hanbei and Ranmaru got in last, and judging by the looks on their faces, this wasn't the first round of teasing. Of course, things would only get worse when Noh and Okuni came out, because even I doubted the Demon King's wife would miss this kind of chance to tease her childhood friend.

But before that could happen, we needed to settle the small matter of the satnav. Or more to the point, rechecking the directions. "Alright, so apparently the Saika village is some distance in that direction." Fortune announced, waving her arm to the left. "I say we make camp tonight and set off, at a _reasonable_ time, tomorrow. Any objections?"

"Define reasonable." Nobunaga questioned. However, he never got an answer, because Kojuro's sudden decision that we weren't going to the Saika village kind of took precedence over that.

And by precedence, I mean I gaped at him, while Fortune stopped fiddling with the satnav. "Huh?"

"Simple, I doubt the Saika faction in this world is any less skilled than the Saica in ours."

"Well, their leader's a bit more…lecherous." I provided, hoping for a bit of backup from our resident Warriors. Get it, Warriors? Because they're- oh never mind.

"Be that as it may, we're not talking about dealing with one man. It'll be a warzone between the Demon King and trained riflemen."

"Not exactly the place for two girls who faint at being charged." Sasuke added helpfully, ignoring the glares being sent at him by the girls in question.

Slumping in my seat slightly, I thought about our other objectives. "So the Saika village is out until we're trained more?"

"Until we decide you're ready, not before then." Across from me, Fortune paled slightly at Kojuro's words.

My first round of 'training' had started with Noh and Nobunaga displaying their marksman prowess by playing William Tell with me and Keiji, going south when they finally handed my crossbow back and spent the better half of an hour arranging my posture to shoot better. However their demands I run after my own bolts meant my legs were probably in better shape than ever.

Fortune's face hinted at a slightly more hellish lesson, and put me off ever asking the Dragons for kendo advice for the foreseeable future.

Looking around the wagon and meeting sounds of approval to Kojuro's decision, I realised we were still two down. Which of course had to be when Okuni and Noh finally put in an appearance, every piece of hair put perfectly in place, and not a blemish to be seen.

Shrinking a little in his seat to avoid detection, Hanbei was of course immediately noticed. "Up to your old tricks again I see, Crybaby Hanbei."

"The men's bath was packed! We were just looking for an empty one."

Deciding to spare him the indignity of my giggles, I returned to the matter at hand, taking the satnav from Fortune and checking it over briefly. "Well, if the Saika village is out, where should we go?"

"I don't know, why don't you check that big book you were holding at the meeting?" Masamune suggested, his attention more on the severe embarrassing Hanbei was getting. Off to one side, Ranmaru was looking a little uncomfortable, but not too eager to step in. Given the circumstances, I can't say I was too surprised considering the fact that Noh had been all too ready to throw a _knife _before their cover was blown.

Turning my attention to the pile of supplies gathering up at the front of the wagon, it took a few seconds to find the Quest Log, and that was without stopping to see if any dango was left from Okuni's picnic basket. Coming up empty on the sweets front, I wore a pout as I flicked through the pages, arriving at the to-do list.

Other than a few things that I didn't dare suggest to Kojuro until he stopped considering us unable to defend ourselves, not much jumped out. Until Yumekichi literally jumped out of the barrel I'd put the Quest Log on and made me jump. Scrambling to catch the tome before Noh's laughter got any louder, I accidentally lost a couple of loose pages which really didn't help my goal of stopping my clumsy image getting too bad.

Quickly grabbing them before a phantom wind found them interesting, Fortune skimmed them over, finally laughing when she reached the end. "Remember this? 'If we take SB Kanbei and give him SW Kanbei's colour scheme, we get Simon Blackquill from Ace Attorney.'"

"Who's that?" Hanbei asked, his ever present curiosity making a comeback at the mention of his friend.

"Well, he's a prosecutor, making sure that criminals get the justice they deserve." _While being willing to take the blame for a murder he didn't commit, _I very nearly added, but thought better of it. Really, between Hideyoshi's affair with Oyu and Kanbei's similarity to Simon Blackquill, I'd have to keep a close eye on what was coming out of my mouth. Failing that, I'd claim I'd recently joined an order of mute monks and hope nobody questioned the absurdity of it.

Which come to think about it, wasn't that much of an empty hope on this adventure.

As Kojuro began to steer the bandwagon back through the busy streets of Kyoto to our campsite, Fortune moved to sit next to Hanbei, showing him the comparison line I'd printed out when she'd first alerted me to the process Kanbei had evidently went through. This left me plenty of time to use my phone to see if there were any sects of mute monks that I could join should I almost put my foot in it again. Of course, I quickly abandoned this in pursuit of a more pressing issue. "Fortune, I'm getting a wi-fi signal!"

"What, no way!" Passing my phone over to display the evidence, I briefly wondered at the glint in Hanbei's eyes, but let it slide considering the thing was something I was still investigating, let alone a guy from nearly 500 years ago. "Uh Flaxen, why were you looking up sects of mute-"

"Notimportantwehavewi-fi!"

"What's that?" Keiji asked, leaning over for a closer look. Clearing my throat, I realised that I held the attention of the entire gang, including Kojuro, who thankfully only turned slightly. The last thing we needed was destruction in the centre of Kyoto.

"Well, think of it like…"My eyes caught on Sasuke, "A ninja network. All the information you could need or want and all you have to do is put in a request for it."

Yep, probably shouldn't have said that in front of a bunch of warlords, ninjas, retainers and strategists. Luckily I was saved by Hanbei, who had eagerly taken the phone, and was poking it experimentally,

"So long as it's about cats you mean. Why does this one look so eager for a 'cheezburger?'"

Realising that I was now responsible for unleashing Lolcats on the world far too early to ever be sensible, I decided to snatch the phone back before there were any further incidents. Something told me I'd have to keep an extremely close eye on it from now on, or suffer severe consequences…

However, the dark cloud hanging over me vanished when Ranmaru dragged Kanbei back into the discussion, "How would he achieve this? Surely that means he would've had to travel through time as well."

"It's funny," Fortune started, tucking the pages back into the Quest Log for now, "We never actually thought about it. We just…"

"Nodded and went with it?" Okuni suggested.

"Pretty much."

* * *

Hanbei however had retreated into the quiet genius state of mind that was actually quite admirable when you think about it. And he stayed like that even after we'd reached the campsite, wandering a little away to scheme in private.

Not that he was missed much. Kojuro made me and Fortune run a few laps to develop our stamina, while he and Masamune got a start on dinner. Nobunaga and Noh tried to 'encourage' us for the first one, but by then they'd gotten bored and ran out of crossbow bolts. Meanwhile, Keiji and Okuni spoke about her troupe and the various pranks he'd played on Toshiie in the past (coming to a kabuki theatre near you: The Adventure of the Frozen Bath!) And as far as I knew, the Date men were running errands for Kojuro, the success of which would probably be determined by him. Which just left Sasuke and Ranmaru, who were eventually spotted in the back of the wagon, playing a game of Go that seemed to demonstrate they were both supremely terrible, or well versed in letting people win.

Finally around the third lap (or halfway round it at any rate) Kojuro took pity on us, and sent two of the Date men to help us back to the camp. I did mention the laps were around the entire field we were camping in right?

At any rate, dinner wasn't much longer in coming, and after the day I'd just had, I was prepared to eat my weight in rice if it would fill my stomach. Instead, I was treated to a bowl of hotpot, along with the kind of look from Kojuro that told me I would be eating it without complaint.

Luckily for my chances of survival, if there was something my stepdad loved cooking, it was hotpot. Tucking in eagerly, I narrowly missed Hanbei's return to the group. "Harvard." Was all he said before gratefully grabbing a bowl for himself.

Unsure how he'd gotten his information or whether it was a _supremely _lucky guess, Fortune asked the question. Looking between my meal and the latest situation, I settled with the former, determined to get my fill before dealing with any more weirdness. And then my phone just had to drop next to me on the grass, Hanbei displaying a guilty look.

Oh this was going to be a fun story, I could already tell.

* * *

Thankfully, we were allowed to finish our dinner before Hanbei decided to explain his reasoning. Apparently he'd grabbed my phone as I was getting out of the wagon, the action going unnoticed. From there he'd simply navigated the internet with an ease that really had me nervous, especially seeing as he didn't even stop to look at funny cats. After looking up what it took to become a prosecutor, it was really just a short step to Harvard from there because even I knew what that place meant.

Of course like all great thinkers, at least the ones I knew, he'd chosen to leave out a few things. "The time travel issue?" Noh asked, raising an eyebrow at the logic we'd all just been submitted to.

"Well, I figured we're working in a stable loop. Maybe it was _us _that dropped him off!"

I cast a look at Fortune, which she shrugged at. As far as reasoning went, that was the best I'd heard. Only it turned out that that wasn't what she was trying to get across. "Hanbei, tuiton at Harvard costs heaps. I really doubt we got that kind of cash together."

"Not to mention the fact that Kanbei is a little…tied up when it comes to recruiting him." I added, remembering the (actually pretty funny) situation the poor guy was in. I couldn't see us getting the key to those cuffs anytime soon.

Deflating slightly, Hanbei gave a small pout, staring into the embers of the fire. "I'll think of something," He finally whispered. "I always do."

* * *

Snapping awake instantly, I scanned the area, trying to determine what had woken me up. Next to me, Fortune murmured something in her sleep, turning over with a frown. And then it hit me like a ton of bricks.

At home, I slept with my phone in relatively close proximity to my ear. Which meant when the alarm went off…yeah you get the idea. Swearing under my breath, I turned the thing off, sitting up in my blanket to look at the camp.

The rest of the gang, miraculously, were still sleeping and hadn't been woken up by the din that was my mobile. Which wasn't too surprising considering my hair had done its usual night time trick and had grown to around twice what it was during the day, thus working as an extremely effective muffler.

Weighing the pros and cons of going back to sleep (Pro: More sleep. Con: Wake up from Kojuro.) I decided to greet the day, flicking my other alarms off as I did. And then I made the mistake of thinking about yesterday. Truth be told, Hanbei could be onto something with the stable time loop theory, and when you really thought about it, there had to be something we could do to raise funds.

Theorising that I'd have at least another hour before the others woke up, I went to hop into the wagon to grab a book, only to find someone had already beaten me there. Hearing the wagon creak slightly as I climbed up, the little fox whipped round, fixing me with a strange look. For a second we both regarded each other warily, before the kit made a break for it, escaping into the sunrise with an almost practised skill.

When the others started coming round, greeting the Date men who'd apparently taken the last watch, I was still in the back of the wagon, left reeling from the encounter. Breakfast was started without fuss, and while everyone took turns to go get ready, me and Fortune were huddled in the back of the wagon, discussing how to raise funds.

"We could always start a betting pool." I remarked, dragging my hairbrush and spray bottle out from my bag.

"On what? When we hit strike four from Kojuro?"

"No, I was thinking more along the lines of…" I looked over at Hanbei meaningfully, miming opening a book as I did so. "I think this Hanbei would be a little less calm about it."

Fortune spluttered a little, bringing a grin to my face, "So it's a betting pool over how he'd react to Hideyoshi and Oyu? But that involves telling him."

"Hmm, good point." Chewing my lip thoughtfully, I didn't notice Masamune come over, having heard the tail end of our conversation.

"Don't tell me you're talking about this plan of Shorty's."

"We might be." Fortune countered, leaning over the side to better speak to the One Eyed Dragon. "You got any ideas?"

"It's funny, after you pair went to sleep last night, he was talking about robbing that bastard Matsunaga blind and selling the stuff in your time to make up the money."

We both blinked at that. "That's…not a bad idea." I murmured. "It'd give us time to get Kanbei."

"And food that we can actually eat. Heck," At this, Fortune gave a crafty look to Masamune, "It might even give us a chance at Matsunaga's neck."

* * *

Would you believe it, that became the decided upon plan. Apparently, pitching it to the lord of the guy actually driving us around for these little escapades, and _then _to the rest of the camp was always a dead certain way to go about things. Throw in a chance for attempted murder, and you were definitely onto a winner.

And I'd be lying if I said the way Hanbei's face lit up when everyone agreed to the plan didn't bring a grin to my face. Of course, I'd also be lying if I said it stayed there when he admitted to borrowing my phone again. Damn baby faced strategist.

Anyway, after preventing _this _attempted murder, Kojuro loaded us all in the back, and started for our next destination. Within a few minutes, we were parked outside of Matsunaga's (sadly abandoned) treasure house.

Now all we had to do was grab anything that looked valuable, and hope to heck that we'd be able to get back to the modern day without issue. But before that… "Come on, out you coward!" we'd have to hope Masamune didn't destroy the place in his attempts to search for Matsunaga.

Not surprisingly, raiding the various treasures and heirlooms was amazingly easy, and it even left us time to appreciate the finer antiques. "We'll have to come back again sometime." Fortune whispered, admiring a painting of two cranes that Hanbei had screwed his face up at, moving on to look at maps.

Giggling at his reaction, I barely heard Kojuro come back in, practically dragging an effing and blinding Masamune behind him. "I think we should leave now." He stated, leaving no room for argument as always.

"That might be a good idea." Ranmaru agreed, moving away from where he had been methodically examining each and every kettle with Nobunaga and Noh. With a shrug at me, Fortune made to follow, listing several pawn shops for us to visit with our lovely new loot.

Now all we had to do was hope my Skyrim lock pick level meant something in this world too.


	8. Chapter 8

**...Wait, I'm on! Welcome aboard the bandwagon, with free wi-fi and (so long as you don't mind fighting for them) free snacks! Fortune Maiden does not own Samurai Warriors or Sengoku Basara, and nor does FlaxenHairedSamurai. **

**Enjoy the crazy! **

* * *

There was a catch. There always was!

Of _course_, our breaking into Matsunaga's treasure trove went off a little too well. It was abandoned, the nice shiny loot was up for grabs, there was no security system to speak of… one would think the fact that we wouldn't get our chance at Matsunaga's neck (or even a lead on his whereabouts) would count as the downside to balance out our good luck, but sadly the Universe didn't think so.

And _that_ was why the Universe decided to throw half of us into a hole.

"Ow, ow, ow! Get your elbow out of my side!" I cried vainly struggling in an attempt to get comfortable.

"Gladly. As soon as _you _get your side out of my elbow," Sasuke snapped at me.

"Masamune, your swords are digging into me. Can you do something about that?" Hanbei asked as nonchalantly as one might ask for a cup of tea. It made a frightening contrast to his irritated glare.

"What do you want me to do?" Masamune demanded, "I can't even move my arms."

"Um, hold on, I think I can reach them," I felt an uncomfortable movement as Flaxen evidently tried to free Hanbei from his cage of sheaths. "No, never mind. Sorry."

"Don't do that again, please," Keiji winced from his place below the rest of us, "You're heavy enough as it is."

"Hey!" Flaxen cried, and her sharp movement sent jolts through the rest of us.

"Can someone please pull us up already?" Ranmaru called up to the surface world, where we could see the shapes of our other members stand around the hole, and contemplate their navels. Well that's what they must have been doing seeing as they _still _hadn't saved us.

"Hold on, we're working on it," Noh yelled down to us.

"We're going to need a rope," Okuni explained.

"Well hurry up and find one then!" Masamune yelled. There was no answer from them, but we could hear some whispering going on. We had no choice but to wait in our cramped condition until, finally, Kojuro spoke up.

"We're going to go load the antiques on the bandwagon, and then find a way to pull you up. We will be back as quickly as we can."

"Don't go anywhere," Noh had one last laugh that continued to echo in our ears as they all walked away.

Well this was just great. We were completely stuck, and who knew how long they would take. I thought about how we'd gotten into this mess, and whom we could blame for it (besides the Universe anyway). It just suddenly happened out of nowhere. One minute we were walking back to the bandwagons, and the next thing we knew, a hole opened up underneath Keiji and those of us unfortunate enough to be near him when it happened, fell in. That was about ten minutes ago now.

One saving grace to all of this was that none of the antiques fell in with us. It was one thing for _us_ to be in such a bind, but if anything got damaged from the drop, blood would be shed. Then again, if something _had _fallen in with us, the others would have probably thought of a way to get us out already. Just saying.

There was nothing for us to do but wait. Uncomfortable as our situation was, after a while we started to get used to it. As long as no one made any sudden movements, there wasn't much trouble. There wasn't much talking either though. Most attempts at conversations ended prematurely, when it was made clear that only the one making the attempt even felt like talking.

How long did it take to find some rope? Did we even have any in the bandwagon? Thinking on it now, it seemed like such an essential piece of equipment. It had so many uses after all.

As time continued to pass, I began to wonder why there was even a hole here to begin with. Did the ground just cave in? Did someone dig it? Was there some specific purpose to it? Would we soon hear that familiar motto, as that certain terrible trio appeared to take Pika—Oh wait. Wrong universe. We didn't even have the right Hanbei for that.

Sometime later (most likely a minute, but neither of us could reach our phones to check), there was a groan. It didn't come from any of us, but rather the ground. We all froze and glanced at whomever we could see, the same nervous thought running through our minds.

_Don't tell me this hole goes even further!_

No one spoke. No one dared. But the silence threatened to choke us, and finally, in a quiet tone that barely even reached the levels of a whisper, Keiji spoke, "Did—

And as the law of comedic causality demanded, the ground swallowed us further.

* * *

On the downside, we'd fallen so far down that the surface was but a tiny hole above us. On the upside though...

"Sweet freedom," Hanbei, freed from the dragon claws stood up and stretched. The others followed suit, spreading out in case there were any more surprises for us to face.

We could move now, having landed in an unusually wide tunnel. It stretched on in front of us and behind us, and oddly enough, lit torches decked the walls, so vision was hardly an issue.

"Curiouser and curiouser," I muttered, "What is this place?"

"Looks like a tunnel," Keiji stated blankly.

"Brilliant deduction, Flower Boy," Masamune retorted icily, "What's it doing here?"

"Could it be…" Flaxen gasped, "Is this how Matsunaga makes his escapes?" At the mention of Matsunaga Hisahide, a heavy silence fell over us. I could see the gears turning in Masamune's head as he looked around snarling.

"Alright there are seven of us here. Three go that way, four the other way. Find him now!" He ordered. Flaxen and I exchanged looks unsure of what to do. Keiji and Sasuke wore similar intense faces, as they weighed their chances of finding our target. Hanbei crossed his hands behind his head and watched the rest of us. Only Ranmaru stepped forward.

"Rejected."

"_What_?" Masamune snapped.

"Lord Nobunaga is on his way to retrieve us," Ranmaru explained firmly, "We will stay put and wait for him."

"Can the rope even reach us down here?" Sasuke wondered out loud.

"You're a ninja, can't you just wall jump out of here?" Hanbei asked.

"Not really. It's not like hopping through trees," Sasuke shrugged.

Then I thought of something. "Wait, can't _you_ fly?" I asked Hanbei.

He just smiled sheepishly. "No compass," he showed me his bare hands, "It's kinda heavy so I left it in the bandwagon."

"What kind of warrior leaves behind his weapon?" Sasuke scolded him.

"I'm counting on you to protect little old me," he grinned.

"It would have come in handy now though," Flaxen lamented.

"Yeah, there'd be no need for the rope," Keiji muttered.

As we kept debating that though, the fuse on Masamune's temper only grew shorter. Ranmaru was displeased by our side conversation as well.

"Will you pay attention?" Masamune snapped, "There's no way the rope will reach us anyway, so we need to look for a way out. We should split up and start looking."

"What about Lord Nobunaga?" Ranmaru narrowed his eyes. I'd always thought of him as being calm and meek, but he was actually turning out to be quite willful.

"Since you seem so intent on staying here, stay," Masamune countered, "You can tell the others where we've gone when they return."

"I believe you would be the better choice to wait then," Ranmaru retorted, "Your voice carries much better."

The rest of us huddled together and watched their back and forth like spectators watching a ball at a tennis match.

"Shouldn't we do something?" I whispered.

"Maybe take a vote?" Flaxen suggested.

"That's not really how these things work," Hanbei shrugged, "Ran has a good point about not wandering off, but out of all of us here, Masamune holds the highest rank."

"But no one in this group serves him!"

"It's the principle of the thing," Hanbei yawned and leaned against the tunnel wall, "But while they sort it out, we're just following Ran's idea anyway."

"But don't we risk losing Matsunaga?" Keiji frowned, "Maybe we should start searching."

"We don't have any proof he's here to begin with," Sasuke leaned against the wall as well, "The castle was thoroughly abandoned."

"So shouldn't someone tell _Masamune_," I retorted just in time for Masamune to yell one final "Fine!" and storm off ahead.

We watched him leave, with growing tension. Ranmaru just stood his ground, his impassivity never leaving his face.

Hanbei sighed and pushed himself off the wall into an upright position. "And now we follow him," he muttered and started walking.

"What? Why?" Flaxen blinked, "Didn't we _just_ agree that staying here is better?"

"It is," Sasuke conceded, "But I'd rather not be here when Katakura shows up and we lost his Lord." He followed. Keiji gave us a weak grin and went as well.

"They're all nuts," Flaxen sighed.

"Do we follow them or…?"

"We'd better. I don't want to be left here alone." As we watched Hanbei grab Ranmaru's arm and drag him off as well (despite his protests), we exchanged looks and followed their lead.

* * *

To the surprise of absolutely no one, we wound up lost. The tunnel seemed to stretch on forever, and due to Masamune's rage, he led the way without any regard for where he was going. At first we figured it would be fine, we could just retrace our steps, but the more twists and the turns we made, the harder it was to keep track. Our nerves quickly turned to panic though when we saw the slightly dazed look on Hanbei's face, as it became clear that even _he_ could no longer keep track of our route.

Thankfully, no one let anyone say "I told you so" or "We should have waited."

"Are you done sulking now, Date?" Sasuke asked after we'd finally stopped to take a break. Masamune looked as calm as ever, as if he hadn't just gotten us all lost in a bunch of mysterious tunnels in a fit of hot-blooded rage.

"Oh yes, definitely," Masamune grinned and quickly moved into a fighting stance, hand poised over one sword. Flaxen and I jumped back as Sasuke moved to a protective crouch in front of us and Keiji and Ranmaru adopted combat poses as well (Hanbei just sidled alongside the wall towards us).

"Matsunaga?" Flaxen asked half-expectant, half-frightened.

"Who knows," Masamune whispered, "I sensed we weren't alone for a while now though."

"So you weren't just walking around randomly?" Keiji grinned, "Not bad."

"You should probably hide your bloodlust though," Sasuke warned, "Don't scare him off."

The tension of an upcoming battle was thick in the air. I huddled closer to Flaxen, not sure if I was really ready for this. I still couldn't tell if there was really anyone, but I knew he had to be getting closer, judging from the way our resident warriors honed in on his location.

After several tense moments, I could hear it. The sound of someone's heavy footsteps against the dirt path. There was also another sound; something big was being dragged. And there was a third sound... a metal clanging?

My mind didn't get the chance put all of the pieces together. As soon as a silhouette came into view, they lunged.

And a loud anguished "WHY MEEEEEEEEE!?" echoed through the tunnel walls.

* * *

"It's not Matsunaga," was all Masamune could say with a nonchalant shrug. Ranmaru buried his red face in his hands, Keiji smiled apologetically, and Sasuke facepalmed. The silhouette had been revealed to be a large burly man with a pair of handcuffs chained to a large wrecking ball. After his surprise encounter with our four madmen, he was sitting against the wall, slightly disheveled.

Flaxen stared at him pityingly. "Isn't that…?"

"How convenient," I muttered.

Ranmaru, a little calmer now, stood up and bowed before the man. "Please forgive us for our hastiness," he said, "We are deeply ashamed to have acted in such a way."

"Speak for yourself," Masamune mumbled, but he quickly shut up when Keiji elbowed him.

"Yeah, sorry about that," Keiji scratched the back of his head and gestured to us with a quick look, "Gotta protect the three little ladies and all that."

"Two ladies, Keiji," I corrected after a moment, surprised that Hanbei hadn't jumped on him for that one himself. But Hanbei stood frozen as he studied the man with a shocked expression.

"…ei," he muttered.

The man glanced up. "Do I know—

"Lord Kanbei!" Hanbei's face suddenly broke into a wide grin and he jumped onto him examining him from all angles. "You look incredible. I _knew_ you couldn't have been born with that miserable complexion. And you're so big and muscular too. I'm so proud."

There were plenty of ways for us to react to this, but instead we all settled on watching Ranmaru, who looked like he'd just stepped into a mad house.

Kanbei just watched Hanbei in his confusion. "Who is this child?" he asked us.

"Child?" Hanbei repeated affronted, "How rude! I'll have you know I am two years older than you."

"Do you even _know_ his current age?" Sasuke asked, but was ignored.

"Wait isn't this the guy we were trying to find?" Masamune asked us. We nodded.

"Find me? Who are you people?"

Hanbei, still beaming, answered. "I am your best friend from the future. You and I are going to help Lord Hi—

"Wait a minute!" Ranmaru, unable to take anymore, interrupted, "L-Lord Hanbei. Have you forgotten yourself? We're not in our world anymore. This isn't the Lord Kanbei you've fought alongside."

Kanbei stiffened, while Hanbei just shook his head. "I haven't forgotten anything," he replied, "Ran, you forget that I know everything there is to know about Lord Kanbei. I knew from the moment I saw him, that _this _man is the very same Lord Kanbei I proudly call my best friend."

It wasn't an exaggeration to say all of our jaws hit the ground at that announcement.

"H-hey weren't we just kidding about that?" I whispered to Flaxen.

"Of course. No matter how you look at it, this Kanbei and that Kanbei don't look anything alike!"

"What are you saying?" Hanbei exclaimed dramatically, "Of course they look alike. They have the same rugged face, the same beady eyes, the same nose… sure Lord Kanbei is a little bigger and healthier looking right now, but don't worry, Harvard will suck his soul out soon enough."

There really was no way to argue with that logic. I still wasn't convinced that Hanbei hadn't just gone stir crazy from being down here so long, but since Ranmaru had given up trying to convince him, I wasn't going to be the one to do it.

Despite how brief their exposure to each other had been, the others didn't seem eager to argue with Hanbei either. Only Kanbei, future best friend and babysitter of the guy himself, still had questions. Lots of them. It was understandable, really.

"I'm going to stop you there," Sasuke said to him calmly, "Do you _really _want us to answer you or do you think it would be wiser if you just nodded and went with it?"

"Just one question then," Kanbei said and regarded Hanbei carefully, "Is this boy really that Takenaka Hanbei?"

"Oh no, no, he's a different one," Keiji cut in, well aware of the history between those two, "This one's cool."

"Very well."

"Now then, may I ask a question?" Ranmaru raised his hand politely.

"Yeah?"

"Do you happen to know the way out of this tunnel?"

* * *

Sunlight! Sweet, beautiful, sunny, sunlight! Oh how I missed it.

Though Kanbei may have spent the whole journey out of the tunnel grumbling about his bad luck, us running into him down there may have been the best stroke of luck we've had in ages… or at least since we successfully looted the castle, anyway.

Kanbei let us out from a hollowed out tree stump, one of the many entrances to his underground maze. There was something inherently amusing about a tree stump leading into a large elaborate tunnel, but there was little time to amuse myself over it, as we still had to get back to the bandwagons and figure out if the others ever found that rope.

Turns out they hadn't.

Down in the tunnels, we'd all wondered how our reunion would go. Ranmaru was certain that Nobunaga would be worried over our disappearance (a sentiment shared by no one really) and the rest of us debated how Kojuro would react. Shame we were broke, otherwise we would have started a betting pool.

Then again, scratch that because Keiji betted on 'They didn't find a rope' and would have won the pot.

Oddly enough though, when we reached the bandwagon between Kojuro's checking Masamune over for injuries and Ranmaru apologizing for worrying his Lord, we realized one very important thing.

"Where'd the antiques go?" Flaxen asked. Sure enough, our bandwagon was as empty as when we got here. As in, it was packed with all of our supplies, but the large pile of treasures was conspicuously absent.

"We cashed them," Okuni answered smiling.

"Wait, what? When?" I asked.

"And where's the cheque?" Flaxen added.

"Here," Okuni handed us a slip of paper. Our eyes widened at all of the zeroes. "While you guys were down there, we decided to quickly take care of business. We also went through all of the necessary headaches to get Lord Kanbei into Harvard."

"Necessary headaches?"

"Well you can't just drop someone off in one of the most prestigious law schools without first making sure he's enrolled!" Okuni leaned into the bandwagon and handed us a thick folder. Inside were various forms, and legal-looking documents, all under the name "Simon Blackquill". It hurt my head to look at them, so I decided to just trust Okuni that they were all there.

"Alright, thanks. That saves us a lot of time," I said. Sasuke, having heard the whole conversation was critical though.

"You spent all that time in the future, and you couldn't bring back a rope?"

"Priorities."

"Good to know."

"And it seems that you kids picked up another hunk for us," Okuni's smile widened as she took notice of Kanbei, "And that is…"

"Kanbei. Your world's, apparently," Sasuke told her.

"Is that right?" Okuni didn't seem even slightly fazed, though we all knew that she should have known what the Kuroda Kanbei of the Warriors world looked like.

The Odas on the other hand…

"Hanbei, that is not the Lord Kanbei from our world," Noh insisted.

"Of course he is. My Lady, I would have thought you of all people would notice."

"I for one see the resemblance," Nobunaga said.

"Really?" Ranmaru's eyes widened.

"Of course," Nobunaga raised his arm dramatically, "Look at the way his eye twitches as he stares at Hanbei contemplating strangulation. It's exactly the same."

"Huh, now that you mention it…"

"Yes! I see it clearly, my Lord," Ranmaru agreed.

"We don't need that kind of observation!" Hanbei protested. Kanbei's eye just continued to twitch as he stared at Hanbei contemplating strangulation.

Keiji watched the scene with a light smile. "It's kinda nice to see them get along so well," he said to us.

"Does he not get along with your world's Hanbei?" I asked.

"It's complicated," Keiji waved us away, "But I'm surprised how easily Hanbei just accepted all of this."

"He's an odd one," Flaxen said.

"Mm," Keiji nodded absently, and it was clear that there was something else on his mind. His gaze was completely fixated on Kanbei and Hanbei's chatting figures a few feet away.

"Something troubling you?" Okuni asked him with a kind smile. Realizing that we were all giving him worried looks, Keiji put up his hands in front of and shook his head, grinning sheepishly.

"No, no. Nothing at all. Hanbei's insistence that this is the same Kanbei he's friends with just made me wonder if there may be others like that." He locked eyes with one of the Date men at that moment, and quickly excused himself to talk to him.

Flaxen and I exchanged glances, but neither one of us really understood what it he was trying to say.

His odd comment was quickly forgotten though as we had more important things to think about: dropping Kanbei off at Harvard. We all piled into the bandwagon, which became even more cramped, and rode around for a while trying to get the horses to 88mph, a task especially difficult when there was a ball and chain dragging along the side of the bandwagon. Somehow, we managed it anyway.

We arrived at the gates of Harvard, not attracting much attention because the last thing the highly stressed out students wanted to do was acknowledge that a bandwagon carrying a bunch of cosplayers appeared out of nowhere. Or that their newest student wore handcuffs. With a ball and chain attached.

"Are you sure you cannot remove these?" Kanbei asked, holding up his cuffed wrists.

"Sorry, no," I avoided looking at him.

"But don't worry! We guarantee that you'll get them removed at the end of this," Flaxen added.

"And the end of this will be…"

"…10 years. Give or take."

"I see."

"They'll fly by fast!" I added hastily.

"Yeah, for us especially," Masamune grumbled under his breath, and scooted to the space created by Kanbei's leaving. It had been agreed upon that no one but Kanbei was to leave the bandwagon. Who knew what these guys would get up to if we gave them free reign! (Never mind that some of them decided to have an adventure here without our knowledge and couldn't even buy a measly rope.)

"Good bye Lord Kanbei," Hanbei said, mock-tearfully, "Take care of yourself alright. And remember, you're the only one who can match wits with me, so these guys shouldn't even be in your league."

"Hanbei, these are allegedly some of the brightest minds in the country," I reminded him.

"Like I said, not even in your league, Lord Kanbei," Hanbei repeated, "We'll pick you up soon. Make sure you're the top of your class or I won't forgive you!"

With that heartfelt(?) goodbye, Kanbei turned around and stepped past the gates to begin his life-changing story. The rest of us, safely tucked in our bandwagon, wondered what our next move was.

"Let's just skip forward a few years and grab him already," Keiji said.

"That would probably be best," Ranmaru agreed.

"Or we could go back to searching for Matsunaga. It's not like Kuroda's going anywhere," Masamune countered. He and Ranmaru glared at each other again, and those of us who'd spent most of the day in a hole, felt a foreboding sense of déjà vu.

…This was going to end with someone storming out of the bandwagon, wasn't it?

"Er how about we—

"Let's hold a contest."

Flaxen's suggestion was suddenly cut off by Noh's calm suggestion. All glaring ceased immediately.

"A contest?" Sasuke raised a brow, "Another MAN—

"Please no!" Flaxen and I whimpered.

"No, not this time," Noh nodded at us, "Something more interesting."

We considered this. "Interesting" was always… well _interesting_, but coming from Noh, it likely wasn't a good kind of interesting.

"I've thought it over and I realized I haven't met any women from the other world," Noh explained, "I thought it would be interesting to test them out."

"Test them out, how?" Keiji asked. Ranmaru grimaced.

"Lady Noh, surely not—

"That's right Ranmaru," Noh grinned, "I propose we hold a beauty contest."

Flaxen and I made a mental note to add more women to our party in the future. So that we'd actually have someone willing to protest.

* * *

-Bonus Scene-

"Oh hey, I just realized something," Flaxen said to me, holding up a checklist. It contained a list of all the items that had been picked up for Kanbei for his tenure at Harvard. "There's no Japanese-English Dictionary on this."

"Huh? Why would he need that?"

"Well how is he supposed to understand everyone?"

I bit my lip nervously. "Um, Flaxen, how are _we_ understanding everyone right now?"

She caught my drift and glanced over to where our other members were going over plans for the beauty contest. They were still within earshot, and in that moment the words coming out of their mouths became completely foreign to us.

"Forget I said anything!"

"Y-yeah, let's just ignore that," I added and the two of us went over to join them, their words clear once more.


	9. Chapter 9

**Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, this chapter comes to you on a very special day. Not only is it Father's Day, but it's also officially one year since Fortune Maiden and I conceived this idea! And believe me, the next year will only bring more bandwagon comedy! **

**Neither Fortune Maiden nor I own Sengoku Basara, Samurai Warriors or Taiko.**

* * *

Despite my fairly non existent stamina and lack of crossbow skills, I absolutely love playing badminton. That's most likely down to one of two things, it involves whacking a small projectile at an enemy, or because of all games I've ever played, it's the one I've had the least injuries in, minus a few sore muscles and the occasional tap to the face from a shuttlecock. However, one day when we were _not_ playing badminton, and were putting the remnants of our basketball practise away, I suffered an injury so great, it could've possibly become traumatic for me to enter the store cupboard or play another round of badminton again.

The wire basket that we used for netballs and basketballs had been put way out of reach behind all of the badminton posts, and as I've already mentioned, I possessive little to no aiming skills, so throwing my orange sphere would've done nothing. This left me with only one option.

Before and after every lesson, the blue wheeled posts would be wheeled about by students and put tidily away at the end, without being propped up on each other. Like an idiot, I believed this to be the case, and stepped on a base so as to cross the cupboard and get to the ball basket. Unfortunately, that didn't quite work out in reality as it did in my head, which promptly got the side of a post slammed into the left side, much like the rakes in cartoons. Like I said, could've traumatised me. Luckily, I recovered quick enough to laugh about it, and to this day I stand on the posts to reach over.

So, if nothing really came of it, why mention it at all? Well, an unproven case of ADHD aside, I just wanted to give an example of the thickness of my skull, the density of which I tested quite well after Noh's lovely suggestion of a beauty contest with a large book that detailed a certain warlord's rise to power, and may or may not have contained evidence of a love affair between said warlord and the sister of one of our bandwagon members.

"Keep going like that and you'll be reading _Taiko _online for weeks." Fortune advised, wincing as the hardcover met my forehead again.

"I'm. Hoping. She'll. Get. The. Message." I grunted between hits.

Watching this exchange with a raised eyebrow, Okuni suddenly grabbed one of my wrists, successfully preventing it from moving, but causing the book's opposite corner to stab me. "I don't know what's worse, the fact that you went to your house to get this, or that you forgot a rope."

Rubbing at the slight dent in my skin, I hid the book under the rest in the bandwagon, resting my chin on my hands as I shrugged, "Doesn't seem to be having any effect anyway."

"Not really," Fortune laughed, looking over to where Noh seemed to be writing a list of every woman that she knew in her world, occasionally adding a mark next to one of the names. Ranmaru and Nobunaga were close at hand, thinking up possible names too.

Finally, after about half an hour, the menfolk of Basara were summoned back from where they'd been spending their time napping, scouting, arm wrestling and making sure the horses were fed. I'll let you guess who was doing what.

"Now commencing the second Bandwagon meeting." Noh announced, holding her list out. Glancing at Fortune, I nonetheless took a seat on the grass; suddenly feeling like this meeting was going to well worth the time it took up.

Once everyone was seated and the horses returned to the wagon, the meeting really began, "We've compiled a list of every woman we know from our world, and all you have to do is tell us if they exist here."

"Why wouldn't they ask us?" I whispered to Fortune, getting a shrug in return.

"Couldn't have anything to do with the fact that you were intent on breaking that book with your head, surely."

"So she did notice!"

Rolling her eyes at me, she turned back to the meeting, just as Noh read the first name out, "I know you have an Oichi and a me, but what about a Gracia?"

"Who?" Masamune inquired, answering the question at the same time.

Thankfully, Hanbei explained anyway, "She's Mitsuhide Akechi's daughter. Sweet kid."

The second those words left his lips, my first instinct about the meeting's outcome was proven correct in the most satisfying way, watching the faces of the Basara cast twist into horror at the very thought of their Akechi having a kid and the implications behind that. Sasuke was even murmuring something about 'checking loose ends' when this adventure was over.

Ignoring our giggles, Noh shook her head and spoke the next name on the list, shattering the mood almost instantly, "Alright, how about Nene?"

My giggles caught in my chest, even as one of the Date guys asked who she was, eyes roving over to Keiji of their own accord. I didn't know what I expected, for him to close up suddenly or to stalk off to be on his own for a bit. Instead, he grimaced slightly, rubbing the back of his head.  
Something in that simple expression told Noh all that she needed to know, and in an unexpected show of kindness, she quickly moved on.

* * *

It wasn't until later, while Noh was frowning over her admittedly short list of contestants, that I had time to speak to Keiji in private. He'd moved away from the rest of the group, even leaving Yumekichi behind to watch Fortune's next lesson with the Oshu Dragons. Seeing as my teachers were preoccupied, I carefully crept away, tapping him on the shoulder just as he was dipping his feet into the river that we'd been using to get ready each morning, "You want to talk?"

"Huh? Sure, if something's bothering you." Pulling my trainers off, I let my feet join Keiji's, shivering a little at the temperature. Laughing at my reaction, he seemed to be edging back to his old self, which made my self imposed mission a little harder to complete.

Luckily for me, it was Keiji that broke the silence, "Was I that obvious?"

"Huh?"

"Leaving like that. Was it that obvious?"

Biting my lip, I turned my attention back to the river, tucking my toes in. "I'm not sure. I just wanted to make sure you were okay after…well after that."

Frowning softly, Keiji leant back, looking up at the clouds, "Their Nene…" He whispered, talking as though he was dreaming, "What's she like?"

Despite the situation, I managed a laugh, "She's very different from what you'd expect, always acting like a mother to Hideyoshi's men, whether they want it or not!"

His head was tilted in my direction, seemingly intrigued by my description, so I continued, and by the time Kojuro was calling chow time, Keiji's stomach was grumbling at the thought of her cooking, even as his mouth laughed. "A ninja, playing the flute?"

"Yep, she wouldn't let up on it. So of course by the end of things, he was piping away!"

"That sounds like Nene alright. Once there was an idea in her head, nobody stood in her way." Following close behind him as we went back to the camp, I began biting my lip, wondering if there was a way we could resolve things. While rescuing Keiji's Nene would clear up a lot of problems for our wandering vagabond, something told me that _she _wouldn't like that plan. After all, if the second season of Basara and her brief character page on TvTropes was anything to go by, she knew full well what Hideyoshi had planned for her.

And then, in the typical Flaxen manner, the answer hit me head on, spurred on by a stupid decision. "Seriously, how have you not broken that book yet?"  
Fortune joked, watching my fairly predictable reaction to Noh's suggestion that we find some way to unleash Oichi's dark powers to make the contest 'more interesting'.

"A great deal of skill, practise and- I've got it!" My cry made the entire camp turn round, Fortune openly raising an eyebrow. Something told me that my idea would be raising a lot more once I explained it. "We're completely missing someone! Hanbei, what about Oyu, your sister?"

"What about her?"

"I have a plan that's just crazy enough to work. And if it does, we can bring Oichi here for the beauty contest, and take her along for when we kill Matsunaga."

It was then that I realised that describing my plan as crazy was not the best way to get people on board, which considering their current situation was actually quite strange. Turning to face Fortune, I fixed what I hoped was a convincing smile onto my face, "Remember why I suggested this whole thing?"

She slowly nodded, "Yeah, you'd just found out that Matsunaga was still alive. What about it?"

"He wasn't the only one who appeared though, was he?" When the realisation began to dawn on her face, I grinned again, looking back at the others.

"Looks like your alternate needs target practise, Lord Nobunaga."

Fortune took over then, excitement entering her tone, "Oichi survived the gunshot because of her dark powers. And the one episode she appeared in was with Matsunaga, who didn't seem too keen on sticking around when her powers showed up."

"So the bastard has a weakness." Masamune grinned, much to the cheer of the Date guys, "One that we can exploit."

Nodding, I was cut off by Fortune's continued explanation, "Not just a weakness." Turning in confusion, I was met with her triumphant grin, "You mean you didn't notice? Name one character that stayed dead after season one."

"Nagamasa Azai?" Sasuke helpfully provided, getting a mock glare from Fortune.

"He seemed happier giving Oichi fuel to be depressed." I smirked, "You're thinking about Nohime."

Our Noh scoffed, but Fortune nodded, the action lighting up the faces of the Basara team.

Speaking for the team, Hanbei began stroking his chin thoughtfully, "You said that she was killed by Lady Oichi in that world?"

Come to think about it, Oichi had been pretty emotional when Nagamasa was, you know, bleeding to death in her arms. Who's to say that a small hint of dark power didn't get him? And if it did, then that meant… "Oichi has the power to kill a Basara character permanently."

"Exactly."

With that news, you could say that the mood in the group increased rapidly for the better, after all, it meant that Noh got her beauty contestant and we had a weapon to kill Matsunaga. I'd almost forgotten the entire reason I was still hugging _Taiko _until Okuni raised her voice, "What about Oyu? You mentioned her before Matsunaga."

Blinking slightly, it took me a few seconds to grasp her meaning, gasping comically when I regained my train of thought, "I was just thinking about something me and Fortune had always agreed on regarding Oichi. She's scared of her powers and what they do. Heck, her crying was what caused the episode in the first place!"

"Yeah, Red mentioned that when I asked about his trip to Satsuma." Masamune agreed, folding his arms, "But what does that have to do with Shorty's sister?"

In answer, I began flicking through _Taiko's _pages, vainly searching for the passage I needed. Fortunately, Fortune quickly came to my rescue, guessing at the point I was trying to make, "_Taiko _describes her as gentle and kind, which is just what Oichi needs."

Closing the book again, I nodded sharply, "If Oyu can't calm the dark powers down, then no-one can." Well, there was _somebody else _I had in mind, but that was neither here nor there at the second.

Apparently though, Fortune didn't agree with me, waiting for the group to begin preparing to leave again before reaching for my arm, fixing me with a suspicious stare, "Gentle and kind, yes. But I thought we agreed Oyu preferred going along with things rather than instigate them."

Grinning guiltily, I predicted her next question before she asked it, "What are you up to?"

Looking back at the others, I bit my lip, hovering on whether or not to tell. After a few tense seconds, I finally sighed, letting my head sag, "I wanted to grab Nene too."

"Wait, is this about Keiji going all quiet and stalking off?"

"You know, he's going to be pretty torn up that he really _was _that obvious."

"Flaxen, I'm serious." Fortune glanced over, checking that the others were in fact still negotiating space in the wagon before turning back to me, "She won't be the same Nene."

"But she's a closer match than the Warriors Nene. And besides, it'd give her a chance to get away from Mr Can't-Keep-My-Eyes-Still."

Shaking her head, Fortune sighed slightly, finally looking at me with a smile, "Alright, we'll try it. But if the affair gets mentioned, then it'll have been a missed opportunity."

"Then you distract Hanbei and I'll pitch it to the others." Rolling her eyes, Fortune made for the bandwagon, climbing onto the box so she could set the satnav for Kojuro. All I had to do was make sure we just so happened to appear when Nene and Oyu were having tea together or shopping.

Only problem was, I couldn't remember anything like that happening in _Taiko._

* * *

After the typical routine of time travelling and finding a field to camp in for now, Fortune and I quickly switched into our yukatas before leaving with Okuni and Ranmaru to find the first contestants for the beauty contest. Our team had been selected based on qualities such as subtlety, formal manners, lack of acquaintance with either Oyu or Nene and Kojuro wanting to stay behind.

And then Okuni had begged to come with us as well.

"Exactly what kind of time period are we looking at here?" She asked, twirling her parasol as we walked.

"More to the point, how are we even going to find Lady Oyu?" Ranmaru added.

"I chose a time when Hideyoshi was away." I shrugged, "If we get lost, we just say that he sent us."

Nodding at my explanation, Fortune suddenly asked, "Wait, wouldn't he be Kinoshita Tokichiro at this stage?" Thinking on it, I opened my mouth to answer, only to be left gaping when a hand closed around my arm,

"You have a message from my husband?"

Turning to look at the speaker, I realised that I wasn't looking at one, but two women, the taller of which was holding my arm. There was unconcealed worry in her wide eyes, easier to see because of the blue band holding her dark hair away from her face. Clearing my throat, I glanced at Fortune who nodded slightly, agreeing with my unspoken guess, "Lady Nene?"

"Yes, you mentioned my husband. Is he alright?" She glanced back at the girl behind her, "Is Lord Takenaka alright?"

Stepping forwards slightly, Ranmaru took over the situation, thankfully, leaving me to look at who I presumed was Oyu. My assumption was only proven right when Ranmaru outright asked her, and she confirmed her identity. Oyu's hair was lighter and shorter than Nene's, but her bangs hung down slightly, helping to frame her face prettily.

"We didn't mean to worry you, my Ladies, we were just unsure of where to find you both." Ranmaru soothed, receiving relieved sighs from the pair in return.

"If not my brother or Lord Hideyoshi, why would you need to speak to us?" Oyu whispered, moving out of Nene's shadow slightly.

Fortune took over then, "This may sound slightly crazy, but we're on a mission of justice, and we really need your help so we can complete it."

Considering it, Nene frowned suddenly, "How long would it take?" Looking at her in shock, Oyu switched her target to me when I answered,

"We don't really know."

"I see." Nene murmured, "So you can't guarantee that we'll return in time to meet my husband when he returns from battle?"

"I didn't say that. Our quest takes us throughout time, so when we complete our goals, we can drop you back where or whenever you want." Fixing my most winning smile onto my face, I patiently waited for their answer, twisting my hands while they discussed it quietly.

Finally, with a final nod from Oyu, Nene turned back to face us, a small smile on her face, "I suppose it couldn't hurt to join your quest, but only if you promise we won't be late for Hideyoshi's return."

Laughing with relief, I nodded, sharing a glance with Fortune. She grinned back, and if that was her reaction, then I couldn't wait to see Keiji's.

* * *

On our return to the bandwagon, it was actually Hanbei's reaction that was the surprise. While the others stared blankly at us, clearly wondering why there were two women (including Keiji much to my mild annoyance,) Hanbei jumped up, running straight over to Oyu, "Wow, it really is you sis!"

Poor Oyu desperately looked at us for help, but I was too busy rolling my eyes, "I blame Orochi."

"Why not? It has the same affect as nodding and going with it." Fortune giggled weakly, rubbing at her forehead, "Oyu, meet Hanbei from another universe. Hanbei, back off a little?"

Hanbei did back off…right into Nene's face, "And of course, you're the Nene of this world, right?" Although we hadn't exactly lost the group's attention, that question did kind of poke everyone awake again, Nobunaga even looking at Ranmaru to check the claim.

Moving my eyes back onto Keiji, I saw a very small, but very happy smile on his face, as though Nene's mere presence was taking some of his burden away. "Hey Keiji," Fortune called, "Mind acting as temporary bodyguard for our two new recruits, just until they find their feet?"

I could've hugged her! Ignoring everyone else's confused looks, Keiji nodded eagerly, and they went over to sit by him, Nene thanking him as she did.  
It was a happy scene, and one that could've lasted a while if Noh hadn't waved her hand, "And the rest of the competitors? When do we collect them?"

"Shouldn't finding a venue take precedence?" Sasuke queried, "After all, we don't want to tear up some innocent's field just for that."

"So what, some place where chaos can reign interrupted?" Masamune smirked, the expression quickly disappearing when the Odas gave curt nods. I wonder how he'd take the description of a beauty contest from our time. I mean sure, there was less bloodshed, and it was less on battle skills than baton twirling or singing but man, those girls could be mean!

"Well, there are plenty of places like that in our world." Kojuro admitted, "The question is which to choose."

"It would probably be better to stay in the Basara world for Oichi's sake as well." Okuni interjected, "Especially if she's as volatile as you say."

"Somewhere the spectators would be safe from all the action would be nice too." I may have reluctantly agreed to this beauty contest, but there was no way that I was taking part.

"Any more conditions?" Noh asked, only partially annoyed. I hoped. When there were no more suggestions, she sighed, "So, where do you have in mind?"

The camp went silent for a few minutes, wracking their brains for the best spot, until one of the Date guy clicked his fingers, "How about that crater at Sekigahara? If we time it right, then that giant hotpot should still be there, same with the scaffolding!"

"Good thinking, Yoshinao." Masamune nodded, turning to look at the rest of us, "Sound good to you guys?"

While the Odas looked a little blank (probably wondering why there was a giant hotpot in the crater) the other Basara characters and the scarily aware Okuni and Hanbei voiced their agreement. "So, unless there's any business left to do here?" Kojuro asked, already getting to his feet, "Then I suppose we should begin to arrange seating."

I…hadn't thought about that one, and going by Fortune's look, neither had she. Getting everyone on before had been enough trouble, but with two extra people…oh joy. Glancing at the others, I saw that my sentiments were very much shared by the rest of them. Well, with any luck, this would be a quick and relatively painless procedure.

* * *

"Ow, Sasuke you're sitting on my hand!"

"Okuni, could you please move your parasol?"

"I'm pretty sure that's not my elbow in my side…"

Sighing, Kojuro turned back to look at all of us, Oyu and Nene having to turn with him to accommodate the shift. We'd finally managed to get everyone in the wagon with all of the weapons and other gear, but it was far from comfy. In fact, being in this situation made that hole outside of Matsunaga's hermitage seem like the Ritz!

"There has got to be some other way of arranging everybody." He murmured, stepping down from the box. He disappeared from my view for a second, only to reappear when he tugged Ranmaru free, inadvertently creating a slight gap for the rest of us to fall onto. Groaning slightly as I stood back up, I leant against the side, rubbing at my arms.

The others were all trying to get out so we could have another go at packing ourselves in, Sasuke swinging himself onto the side to let Okuni past him.

"Wait a second," I mumbled, copying his position. A smile worked its way onto my face, "How good's your balance?"

"Considering I'm a ninja, I'd say pretty good." Looking confused, he realised what I was getting at, nodding in agreement as he turned to the rest of the group, "How about you guys?"

We ended up with Sasuke sitting on one side, holding onto the box with one hand and his other arm around me, while Hanbei took the other side with Fortune, his compass within easy reach if they needed it. Sitting like that, with some of the Date men resting against our dangling legs made for much easier travelling, and Kojuro was moving the horses along without delay. Swaying dangerously, I felt Sasuke tighten his grip as we began speeding up, the feeling of travelling through time hitting me like a train. I heard Oyu and Nene gasping in wonder as they realised what was happening, and I heard the satnav chime that we had arrived.

I heard all of this just as there was a tremendous lurch and crash, everybody reaching to grab onto something as Kojuro cursed under his breath, trying to get the horses back under control as the wagon dipped on our side. Fortune screamed when she saw me and Sasuke fall back, one of the Date guys' hands brushing my ankle as he and his partner tried to pull us back in.

My head smacked off the ground, Sasuke grunting a second later. Gasping in pain, I managed to sit up a little, grimacing as my vision finally stopped swimming. The others were running over to us, looking all set to crowd us. Looking past them, I managed a weak grin at our situation.

The good news? We were at Sekigahara, and the right one as an added bonus. The bad news? One of the bandwagon's wheels was busted and lying about five feet from the rest of it.


End file.
